


That Kind of Story

by fourteencandles (thingsbaker)



Category: Entourage
Genre: F/M, M/M, hurt-comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-06-02
Updated: 2015-04-14
Packaged: 2018-03-22 20:14:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 39,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3742186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thingsbaker/pseuds/fourteencandles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Vince gets sick.  Eric gets a girlfriend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Original notes from my post on LiveJournal in 2008: I feel like the notes on this could go on forever, but -- well, I've spent my wordiness on this story. It was hard to write. I've worked on it for a while. There's a fair chunk of research and conversation behind it, but if something looks off, let me know. Thanks to [](http://shoshannagold.livejournal.com/profile)[shoshannagold](http://shoshannagold.livejournal.com/) for the beta read!

Vince has an insurance physical two weeks before they start filming _Keyword_. Eric goes along because they’re supposed to meet Ari for lunch afterward. He sits in the waiting room and gets a few e-mails off, then flips through a copy of _Variety_ that’s lying on the coffee table. Nice thing about seeing an expensive Hollywood doctor — the lobby has recent magazines and upscale furniture, and the receptionists, Eric has to admit, are gorgeous. There’s even a plasma TV in the corner for his viewing pleasure.  


After an hour, though, he’s tired of waiting, and no amount of expensive distraction can overcome his frustration. Vince is probably in back banging one of the nurses. He’s thinking about going to the reception desk, seeing if one of the girls there can tell him what’s going on, when Vince walks out.  


“No go,” he says when Eric stands to greet him.  


“What?”  


Vince leads him outside by the shoulder. “He’s not gonna sign off yet.”  


“What? Why?” If the doctor won’t sign off, they can’t get the picture insured. Without insurance, there’s no picture — at least not for Vince. And this picture is gonna be big. “Tell me you didn’t piss him off or something.”  


“He found some little bump on my balls,” Vince says, and Eric glances over, sure that Vince is joking. Vince just shrugs.  


“Uh, like an STD?” Eric asks, and Vince shakes his head, a quick, tight, absolute no. “So — a bump like a lump?”  


“What the fuck’s the difference?” Vince asks. He slides on his sunglasses as they cross the parking lot. “Whatever, anyway, he drew some blood, he says I have to come back tomorrow, they run some test, blah blah blah. Then he’ll sign it.” He’s standing by the passenger’s side door, staring at Eric, and it takes Eric a moment to realize that he hasn’t unlocked the doors.  


The car is too hot, and Eric cracks the windows, turns the AC up full blast and waits for it to cool before they move. He’s also waiting to make sense of what’s happening. “So wait, what test?”  


“I don’t know,” Vince says. “He didn’t really say.”  


Eric glances over. “You worried?”  


“Nah,” Vince says. “Well, except that I had about eight hands on my testicles today.” He smirks. “Not too many guys I let mess around down there, as you know.”  


Eric laughs. As far as he knows, he’s the only guy with regular rights to messing around with Vince _down there_ , though there are still plenty of girls who get all-access passes. Oh, man, if it _is_ an STD, they’re both fucked. “All right. So what time tomorrow?”  


“Eight a.m. sharp,” he says. “Where are we going for lunch?”  


“Koi, and we’re late,” Eric says, pulling out.  


Vince groans. “Listen, don’t tell Ari anything, all right?”  


“Sure,” Eric agrees. “We’ll just say the doc was running late.”  


“Good.”  


If Vince is at all worried, he doesn’t show it at lunch, where he cleans his plate of pan-seared scallops and ahi and keeps up lively banter with Ari about the upcoming film. Ari is trying to get him to agree to a detente luncheon with the guy from Warner’s, but Vince isn’t having it.  


“I don’t care if he’s willing to throw me eighty million dollars and his first-born, Ari,” Vince says. “I don’t need his money, and I don’t believe his apologies.”  


“That’s pretty ballsy,” Ari says. “I’m just saying, that’s a dramatic statement from a guy who still needs a distributor for his next project.”  


“I’m a ballsy guy,” Vince says, and his grin doesn’t even flicker. Eric gets it, then, that Vince is acting, this is false bravado, and he’s overcome with real fear, like something heavy and terrible has just settled around his chest. But he also gets that Vince needs to put on this act, to concentrate on arguing and faking a normal face to keep from thinking about whatever this test is about. So Eric joins in and antagonizes Ari like it’s any other day, and when they leave he says, “Hey, you wanna go bowling?”  


Vince blinks. “Bowling? Now?”  


“No, I mean — like tonight. The four of us.”  


“OK,” Vince says, shrugging. “I guess we haven’t done that in a while, huh?”  


They haven’t. Usually, Eric would suggest a bar or a club if he wanted to make sure Vince’s mind stayed off of something, but he has a feeling the usual distractions won’t help. Bars and clubs bring girls, and girls bring sex, and he has a feeling — well, if it was him, he’d want to be distracted completely from thoughts of that region. It’s too windy to golf and the Lakers are traveling, so bowling seems a good option.  


Only when they get there does he realize his mistake. They are surrounded by balls and they are in the company of Turtle and Drama, both of whom are twelve and neither of whom know what’s going on.  


“What are you looking for?” Vince asks Drama as he’s putting on his shoes. Drama is pacing up and down, studying the print on the bowling balls.  


“This,” Drama says, pulling out a blue one. “A twelve-pounder.”  


“Lightweight,” Turtle says.  


“I rely on speed, not brute strength,” Drama says. “Plus, this is just like the one I used to have.”  


Turtle shakes his head. “Small and blue? Pretty much like the ones you still have,” he says, and even though Eric cuts his eyes over and suppresses a little gasp of dread, Vince laughs.  


They drink a couple of pitchers and bowl increasingly bad games, except for Turtle, who’s having a pretty lucky night. Between games they go outside and smoke up, and although Eric would usually warn Vince against using in public, he’s glad to see the pot take hold, glad to see Vince’s shoulders slump a little, his eyes get heavy-lidded. They get back to the house around midnight, and although the other guys talk about hitting the hot tub, Eric says he’s heading to bed. Vince says the same.  


“Yeah, we’ve got a meeting, early in the morning,” he says, and grins. It’s a really good grin, and Eric can tell it’s fake. “This was fun, guys.”  


“Night, man,” Turtle says, settling in on the couch.  


Eric goes to his room, gets ready for bed, and pauses before he climbs in. He considers walking down the hall to Vince’s room. They don’t have a steady thing, and most of their hook ups have happened after nights like this, when they’re both a little drunk, their inhibitions a little lowered. But he thinks again about distractions, and decides a helping hand might not be the best thing he can offer tonight. So he tucks himself in and, after an hour of running through worst-case scenarios, he falls into a heavy, uncomfortable sleep.  


  


The next morning, Vince is quiet on the drive. Eric tries to believe this is about the early hour, but despite Vince’s cavalier acting, he knows there’s more to it. Vince practically _glows_ nervousness. The clinic seems different, too — how did he not notice the smell yesterday, the underlying bleach-and-piss reek? He takes a seat in the same waiting room when Vince goes back, but this time he doesn’t even try to conduct any business. He just sits with his hands between his knees and stares at the TV and tries very hard not to think.  


After about forty-five minutes, a man comes out and calls his name, and Eric stands so fast he knocks a newspaper off of the table. “Mr. Chase asked me to get you,” he says, leading Eric through the doors.  


“Why? Is he all right?”  


“He’s fine,” the nurse says. “Just waiting.”  


He opens an exam room door and Eric takes a deep breath before he walks in. He expects to see Vince lying down, Vince in a hospital gown, maybe, or Vince with an IV — something out of a medical show. Instead he just sees Vince, in his track pants and green T-shirt, swinging his legs over the side of the exam table. He’s text-messaging, and he looks up when Eric walks in.  


“Hey,” he says, smiling like they’re just sitting around at home, like Eric’s just walked into the kitchen or something.  


“Uh, hey,” Eric says. The door closes behind him. “What’s up?”  


Vince shrugs and slides his phone into his pocket. “They’re going to take a look at the results and come talk to me, but he said it might be a little bit. And I was bored.”  


Eric nods. He looks around the room — which is, really, pretty boring, just the exam table and a rolling stool for the doctor, a desk with some medical supplies lining one wall, a framed poster of Mt. Shasta on the other. Eric hauls himself up next to Vince. “Test go OK?”  


“As OK as something like that can go, I guess,” he says. His hands are clenched together, so Eric doesn’t ask about what the test entailed.  


Eric leans his shoulder against Vince’s. “You tell him you bowled a 105 last night?”  


Vince smirks. “I said I bowled 300. Twice.”  


“You maybe could’ve added your scores up to 300,” Eric says.  


“What was yours again?”  


“I think I had a 450,” Eric says.  


“Right.”  


They sit in silence for a minute, and then Vince puts his hand on Eric’s shoulder. “Thanks for coming with me, E.”  


“What else did I have to do?” he says, trying to keep his tone light. He drops his hand onto Vince’s knee, and they stay sitting like that for ten minutes or so, talking about stupid stuff — Ari, the movie, the girl Turtle’s been talking to online — until the doctor walks in. Eric draws his hand back, but Vince doesn’t; his grip gets a little tighter.  


“Don, you know Eric, my manager,” Vince says, and the doctor, Don Richards, nods. They have met before, but it’s been a couple of years — Eric didn’t actually remember him being quite this old. Richards must be at least 60, still tall, with a few distinguished lines on his tan face. His hair is completely white.  


“I assume I can speak freely?” Richards says, and Vince nods. “Well, I looked at the films myself and had our specialist on staff — Dr. Silas, you met her earlier — confirm. We’re definitely looking at a tumor. The good news is, so far it seems like it’s isolated to the individual testicle.”  


Eric feels Vince tense next to him; his hand falls away. “A tumor,” Vince says, and takes a deep breath. “OK. Uh. Jesus.” He slides off the table to stand, and he rubs one hand over his mouth, looks at the floor.  


“What does that mean?” Eric asks, looking right at the doctor. He wants the man to look away from Vince, because he can tell Vince needs a minute.  


“Well, we probably caught it pretty early,” Richards says. “So we can treat it. This is usually a highly treatable form of cancer, OK?”  


Eric nods. Vince turns and puts his hand on Eric’s knee, the other flat on the table, his back to the doctor. “I have cancer?” he asks, and he looks up at Eric. His eyes are moist. “Fuck, I’m _thirty-four_. I just came here for a physical.”  


“Testicular cancer is one of the most prevalent forms of cancer in younger men,” Richards says. Eric wills him to stop talking. Vince doesn’t need more details yet — that’s the stuff Eric needs.  


What Vince needs is this: “You’re gonna be fine,” Eric says, gripping Vince’s shoulder. “That’s what he’s saying, all right?”  


Vince swallows. “All right,” he says. “All right.” He faces the doctor and leans against the table. Eric puts his hand in the middle of Vince’s back, as though he needs to be steadied.  


“So then, what, how do we — what do we —”  


“I talked to Dr. Silas about this, and she agrees, surgery is the first course,” Richards says. “Because we caught this early, we can still remove it, and that will probably keep the cancer from recurring.”  


Eric nods, because Vince seems frozen. He doesn’t blame him — his own testicles are currently trying to retreat into his stomach. “Remove the tumor,” he says.  


“The testicle.”  


“Jesus fuck,” Vince says, half a gasp. His head is ducked down. “You wanna cut off my balls?”  


“Probably just one,” Richards says.  


Eric wants the guy to stop saying “probably.” “There’s no other way?” Eric says.  


Richards pauses. “There are other treatments that are sometimes used. Radiation used to be the major method. But — the survival rate is significantly lower in those cases.”  


_Survival_. Eric squeezes Vince’s shoulder. “OK,” Eric says. “So — you remove it, then it’s all gone? Everything’s OK?” He’ll survive? he asks with his eyes.  


“Probably. I’ll refer you to an oncologist to take a look, decide what to do after that,” Richards says.  


Vince just shakes his head a little, still looking down. Eric says, “Look, do we have to — I mean, you need us to do anything today?”  


“No,” Richards says. “But you should make an appointment with Dr. Silas as soon as possible, get this procedure scheduled. I’m not going to sugarcoat this for you, Vince; if you wait too long, the chances that this will kill you increase dramatically.”  


Vince doesn’t say anything, so Eric nods to let the doctor know he’s been heard. “We’ll be in touch, Don,” he says, sliding off the table. He keeps one hand on Vince’s elbow. Vince stirs himself enough to shake Richards’s hand, at least, but he doesn’t say anything until they’re in the car.  


“I don’t believe him,” he says, crossing his arms.  


“What?”  


“He wants to _cut off my balls_ , E.” His voice is high and desperate. “That’s not right!”  


“He wants to save your life,” Eric says quietly.  


“Oh, fuck you.” Vince turns to face the window. “We should’ve gone to that guy that Ari likes, the one who signs everything.”  


Eric feels a cold, swift shiver of dread. “Hey,” he says, “hey, what, you’re just not going to do anything? This is serious, Vin, you’ve got to take this seriously.”  


“Oh, really? You think I’m not taking it seriously? You’re right, so far it’s been a blast, like with the two doctors and the specialist who came in and felt me up yesterday and the blood test and the humiliating sonogram I had earlier today. I thought that was all just fun and games.” He shakes his head. “Just drive me home, OK?”  


Eric, speechless, does just that. In the driveway, he says, “Are you gonna tell the guys —?” and Vince shakes his head. He gets out of the car, slams the door, and walks in and straight down the hall to his bedroom. When that door slams, Eric is standing in the hall, and the other guys look at him.  


“What’s that about?” Drama asks.  


“Bad meeting.” They won’t press him for details if they think it's business, at least.  


Vince hasn’t surfaced by that afternoon, though, and Eric is worried. Even Turtle seems worried, so Eric takes a bowl of the spinach pasta Drama made for lunch and goes back to Vince’s room. The door is unlocked.  


Vince is sitting on his bed, one knee bent up, his arm over it, staring down the television. He looks over when Eric walks in but only for a second, then he turns back to the show. “What,” Vince says, his face a perfect mask of annoyance.  


“I brought you some lunch.” He walks closer and sets the plate on the bed next to Vince. Vince picks it up and sets it on the floor, and Eric sighs. “You’re gonna starve to death, that’s your new plan?”  


“Could you please get out?”  


“No.” Eric sits on the bed, grabs the remote and mutes the television.  


Vince scoffs and looks away. “What?”  


“I get it,” Eric says. “You’re scared. That’s okay. This is pretty serious shit.”  


“I’m pretty serious about you going away.”  


“You’re scared,” Eric continues, “and man, you should be. I’m scared. But you can’t just ignore this. This isn’t like everything else in your life that’s just gonna get better on its own, that’s just gonna wash away with time. You have to do something, or this is going to fuck you.” He puts his hand on Vince’s arm. “Please. You’ve gotta think rationally here.”  


Vince shifts, but not away from Eric’s hand. “I am being rational,” he says. “I’m in the best shape of my life.” That’s true; he’s been working out daily for this movie, sometimes twice day; he’s running six or seven miles at a time, lifting more than Eric weighs. He’s been keeping to a strict diet, too — they’ve had more vegetables and lean chicken in the house recently than Eric has seen in years. If this doctor is right, all of that has been for nothing. Vince will have to pull out of the movie. “I’ve been working out constantly, you know this, I —”  


“He’s not saying you need to lose some weight, Vince,” Eric says, trying to keep his voice even though his frustration is growing. “He’s not telling you you’re a candidate for heart disease.”  


“I’m saying the guy could be wrong,” Vince mutters.  


Eric sighs. “Do you think he is?” Vince pauses. “Have you, like —”  


“I’ve felt it,” Vince says shortly. “What, you want a peek, is that what this is about?”  


“Jesus Christ.” Eric pulls his hand back and rubs his face. “What if, OK. We’ll get a second opinion. How about that? Maybe he could be wrong.”  


Now Vince actually meets his eyes. He looks angry, but also confused, so Eric knows he’s getting through. “I gotta go through this whole thing again, huh?”  


“I’ll buy you an ice cream,” Eric says. He keeps his eyes on Vince’s. “Come on, man.”  


“OK,” he says, finally, with a very small shrug. “But I want the best, OK? Find me the best ball doctor in California.” Eric snorts — he can’t help it — and Vince grins just a little. The grin flips quickly. “Fuck, E. You think — you really think —”  


“I don’t know,” Eric says. “But I know whatever happens, you’re gonna be fine. OK? That’s my job, right?”  


“Right,” Vince says.  


Eric holds up his hand, and Vince hits his fist. “Now come on, the other guys think you fired me again.” Vince laughs. “Bring that pasta, you need to eat.”  


“All right, boss,” he says, and grins almost like always.  


Almost.  



	2. Chapter 2

Eric calls Richards and tells him the story, and they get a referral to see Randall McNaight the next day. “Top urologist for UCLA,” Eric says as they pull into the parking garage. “Guy graduated first in his class at Yale three times and used to run things at Sloan Kettering in New York. He was called in last year to look at the president.”

Vince makes a face. “I’m not sure I want to know that he’s touched the president’s balls.”

“I’m sure he washed his hands.”

This clinic feels more like a clinic, with white walls and floors and a healthy hustle and bustle on the floor as they walk to the waiting room. Eric understands they are lucky to even be here. McNaight is in high demand. Eric has never been so grateful for Vince’s money and connections before.

“Come on,” Vince says, grabbing Eric by the shoulder when a nurse calls his name. “Your idea, you see it through.”

They’re led to an exam room. It’s just as boring — maybe even worse — than Richards’s room; no art on the wall, here, just light boards and locked cabinets. Vince says, “Do I get a gown or something?”

“No, you can stay dressed,” the nurse says, “but I’m gonna need you to roll up your sleeve, all right?”

Vince glances at Eric, then takes a seat on the exam table and does as he’s told. The nurse draws a full vial of blood — Eric has to look away — and then says, cheerfully, “Dr. McNaight will be here in a second.”

“He’s so good he doesn’t even have to look?” Vince asks when the door closes, and Eric shrugs.

“Just shut up and be happy you get to keep your pants on.”

“I changed underwear today for nothing, that’s what I’m saying.”

Dr. McNaight walks in a few minutes later. He’s younger than Richards by far, with gleaming black hair but no tan — like a guy who maybe hasn’t been outside of a lab in a few weeks. Eric likes him just for that. McNaight doesn’t introduce himself, just crosses to the light board and sticks a couple of films up, then turns around. “Vincent?” he says, looking between them.

“Yeah.”

McNaight nods. He looks at the films, then back at him. “You need to have this surgery,” he says. His voice has a light, untraceable accent, maybe English or German, and this makes Eric trust him even more. He points to the lightboard, to the mess of shadows on the black film that are just starting to make sense to Eric — he’s looking at a scan of Vince’s dick and testicles and lower abdomen. “You have a tumor, just here. I’m showing you even though I know you can feel it; I would guess, also, you’ve had some other symptoms. Some difficulty getting an erection, recently, maybe?” Vince is blushing, which means that’s true. “Or at least a little less interest. Maybe you’re tired. Maybe your stomach hurts sometimes, a little, a dull ache.” He raises one dark eyebrow. Eric turns to Vince, trying to figure out how much of this is striking home. Jesus Christ, he thinks, even as McNaight goes on. “That’s because you have cancer. You have testicular cancer, probably stage one.”

“Probably?” Eric says.

“The only way to know for sure is to cut into the testicle. Which we will do. After we remove it.” McNaight shakes his head. “Men used to die of this, you know. Now, we have nearly a 100 percent cure rate, for men who are treated.”

Eric glances over; Vince’s face is still red, but he’s looking at McNaight, really listening. “What — what kind of side effects will there be?”

“Everything goes well, there will be none. We’ll send you home with some forms, a list of possibilities, but these are rare for me,” McNaight says, then tilts his head. “Do you have children?”

Vince smirks — it’s probably involuntary, because he’s also gripping the edge of the exam table so hard his knuckles are white. “No.”

“Do you want them?”

“Maybe. Someday.”

McNaight nods and pauses. “Then, what we’ll do, we’ll run a hormone test. Today, with the blood you gave us. We’ll make sure everything else is working. If it is, you should be fine. You should have no problems. If you’re very worried, then before the surgery, you go to a sperm bank and get some frozen.” He shakes his finger. “But this is what you’re going to do. You get this surgery done. It’s very simple, I do several a week. You come in the morning, you go home with your friend that afternoon.” He gestures toward Eric, loosely, and Eric looks up at Vince. This is not the meeting he expected. “Today is Wednesday. We’ll schedule for Monday.”

Now McNaight extends his hand, and to Eric’s surprise, Vince takes it. He nods and says OK as he shakes, and then McNaight nods at Eric, tells them to stay put, and leaves the room. They’re left alone, Eric staring at Vince, Vince looking at the ground. Eric wants to ask what changed his mind, but he can guess: Vince just needed someone to tell him exactly what to do, and exactly why. He’s always been happiest taking direction

“Have you been feeling sick?” Eric asks, and Vince shrugs.

“I thought it was the diet,” he says. “And all the working out.”

Eric nods, because that makes some kind of sense. More than the rest of this, at least. Vince just keeps his head down. “He seems like he knows what he’s doing,” Eric says, when the silence stretches on too long.

Vince nods, but doesn’t say anything. He’s still looking down, and Eric studies his shoulders, looks for some sign of what’s going on in his head. He’s got no idea what to say. They’ve never dealt with anything like this. The last time he was in a hospital with Vince, they were both kids, and they had parents to rely on. Eric wonders, briefly, if he should call Vince’s mother. He wants to call his own. Vince says, finally, “Just tell me I’m going to be OK,” and Eric steps forward.

“You’re going to be fine.” Eric puts his hand on Vince’s knee. Vince grips it at the wrist, just for a second, then nods.

The nurse comes back in after a few moments and goes through the surgical preparedness sheet with them. She starts to hand Vince the forms, but he’s still looking down, so she turns to Eric. “These are the guidelines for preparation,” she says, handing over pink forms. “No food or liquids after midnight the day of the procedure.”

Eric glances down at the papers, sees an explanation of exactly what they’re going to do, including an anatomical drawing, and flinches. “Thanks,” he says. “This is — we’ll read it over.”

She nods and hands him another piece of paper with the office phone number circled at the top. “If you have questions, just call,” she says. “My name is Claire.” She smiles before she leaves.

“You see that?” Eric says, turning back to Vince. “You’re getting the eye at the doctor’s office, even.”

Vince doesn’t smile, but he does get off the table and he follows Eric outside. Eric pockets the number and the papers, knows he’ll be reviewing them alone that evening so he can break it all down for Vince in the morning. Vince just sits like a zombie in the car, nodding when Eric asks if he’s OK, shaking his head when Eric asks if he wants to stop for food.

When they stop in front of the house, Eric turns off the car, and they don’t move. Vince is staring straight ahead at his brother’s car. “You want me to tell them?” Eric asks.

Vince shakes his head. Something finally changes on his face: he shakes his head again, like waking himself up. “I’ll tell them, if you’ll tell Ari,” he says, and looks over. His eyes are a little too wide, but otherwise he seems OK. Just, maybe, stunned. Eric understands that completely.

“Deal,” Eric says.

“Tell him all of it,” he says. “Whatever you want.”

“Of course.”

“In person.” Eric nods like that was what he was thinking. “Go now, OK, before the story spreads or anything. Tell him I’m sorry I can’t be there, but — I just can’t,” he says, and Eric puts his hand on Vince’s side, giving him a gentle pat, his hand on Vince’s ribs. He feels warm and well through his shirt; none of this yet seems real.

“I’ll take care of it,” Eric says, and leaves Vince to talk to the guys.

On the way over, Eric tries to think of what he’ll say to Ari and can’t come up with anything. He’s not prepared, he realizes, and he pulls over in front of a Blockbuster Video and gets out the papers from the clinic. Inside is everything he didn’t want to know: the details of the procedure, first, how they’ll pull Vince’s testicle up through an incision made in his abdomen, then how he’ll need four to six weeks to recover completely from that before he can do any strenuous physical labor. Fuck. Eric pictures Vince’s recent training sessions, the fight sequences they saw storyboards on last week. Six weeks is a serious delay, and Eric pushes the number further, because it’s taken Vince months to get in shape like this. His trainer threw a fit when he wanted to take the weekend off for his cousin’s wedding last month. A break isn’t going to fly. Fucking fucking fuck, Eric thinks, and throws the brochure onto the passenger’s seat. Vince is definitely out of the movie.

He shows up unannounced at MGA, but Lloyd lets him in anyway. Ari says, “What, you return calls in person, now?” Eric glances down; he never turned his phone back on after the doctor’s office. “You finally understand how important I am? E, I’m flattered.”

Eric makes sure the door is closed. “Sit down, Ari,” he says, and waits until Ari obliges. He opens his mouth to explain things, but suddenly he can’t. He hasn’t said it out loud yet, to anyone; he hasn’t talked with anyone but Vince and the doctors. The last two days have happened so fast. “We, uh, we have a problem. I need to talk you.”

“If this is about the costume again —”

Eric shakes his head. “Vince went for his physical yesterday.” Ari nods. “They found, uh, something.”

“Something? What, Jesus, tell me it’s not VD. Did I tell you to go to —”

“He’s got cancer, Ari,” Eric says, and watches Ari’s mouth flap uselessly, silently, for a moment. “Testicular cancer. They want, they’re gonna do surgery next week.”

Ari swallows and clears his throat. “Is he,” he says, and then clears his throat again.

“He said to tell you he’s sorry he couldn’t tell you himself, but — he’s kind of having a hard time with it all.” Ari looks very pale, and Eric wonders, suddenly, how he must look himself. He’s not sure he even checked a mirror today. “He’s out for the movie,” he says, after a moment.

“I can get them to delay.” Ari’s voice is flat, like it’s just an automatic response.

Eric shakes his head. “He’s out. He needs the time, or he’s going to need it.”

“OK.” Ari seems to be nodding just to have something to do. His fingers rub over his face, clench together between his knees, tremble across his thighs. “What can I do?”

Eric shrugs. “Right now? Just, maybe, keep this a little quiet. I don’t know if that’s possible —”

“We’ll do what we can,” Ari says. “OK? You tell him — you said surgery? Is he gonna be in the hospital?”

“Just a same-day thing. Monday at UCLA.”

“Call me. I’ll come down. Or afterwards, whenever, as soon as he’s —” Ari stands up, abruptly, and turns away. When he gets to his desk, he says, “I’ll handle things with the movie, all right? Have you talked to Shauna?”

“No, I guess I was gonna do that next.”

“I’ll do it,” he says. He turns to face Eric. “I’ll have her call you. You just — you give my best to Vince. All right?” 

“I will.” He stands, and they shake hands, a serious, slow shake, and then Eric says, “Thanks, Ari,” and walks into the hall.

On the way to the car, he thinks about what they might need. Vince used to like congee from the Chinese restaurant down the street when he was sick in New York; surely there’s a place with good congee here. He gets into his car and heads for home, flips open his phone. “Yo,” he says when Vince answers. “How’re things?”

“Fine,” he says. “The guys think I should get laid.” Of course, Eric thinks, and then he says it and Vince laughs. “How’d it go with Ari?”

“Fine,” Eric says. “He’s taking care of everything, unless you want to tell Shauna.”

“No, that’s good. I really don’t want to hear about the press strategy for this, you know?”

And boy, that is so true. Eric doesn’t even want to think about that yet. “You need anything, while I’m out? Want me to pick up some dinner?”

“Nah, let’s go out. OK?”

“You taking the guys’ advice?”

“Who knows,” Vince says. “Just come home.”

So they go out, first to dinner and then to a bar, and when a girl hits on Vince he goes with it, goes over to the bar with her while Eric and the guys sit at the table. Both guys look across at Eric mournfully. “Guys, he’s gonna be OK,” Eric says. “The doctor said there’s almost a 100 percent cure rate.”

“Almost isn’t a perfect score,” Drama says.

“Think about this shit, E,” Turtle says. “He hasn’t gone two days without since he was 13. You don’t think this is gonna mess that up for him, a little?”

“I read about this today on the Internet,” Drama says. “They make some very convincing prostheses.”

Eric snorts. “You think he should get a fake ball?”

“I’m saying, he should take some time and ask about his options.”

“Yeah,” Turtle says. “Vince says you set everything up for right away — at least give the guy some time to say good-bye, you know what I mean?”

“No way,” Eric says. “Listen to me. The doctor says this is the way to go. Vince’s freaked out enough as it is without you two retards piling on. The doctor, you know what he said today? He said you do this or you die. You want him to delay?” Both guys’ eyes pop open, and Eric wonders exactly what Vince told them. He wonders if he’s even said the “c word” yet. He tries to gentle his tone. “I’m just saying, we need to be supportive right now. OK?”

They nod, and Eric looks up to see Vince walking back over, his usual loose-limbed, three-beer walk. “Where’s your friend?” Eric asks.

Vince shrugs and takes a seat next to him. “She mostly just wanted an autograph.”

Eric watches Turtle open, then close his mouth, and he’s grateful. They all know that Vince can usually turn a request for an autograph into a roll on the nearest flat surface, but they’re being supportive. “You ought to start charging for those,” Turtle says, and Eric nods his approval.

“Right,” Vince says. “Pay for my medical bills that way.” He reaches over and drains Eric’s whiskey. “You guys want another round?”

Vince gets very drunk, which is unusual but understandable. They get him into the car around 1 and it takes two of them to get him inside and onto the couch. Drama, who’s the closest to sober of them all and also the biggest mother hen, volunteers to stay up and keep an eye on him, and Eric staggers up to bed around 3.

The next day they’re all hung over, Vince worst of all, and no one wants to move from the couches. They order in pizza — which, Vince remarks, is the first time he’s broken his diet in three months — and watch movies until midnight. Then, Eric hits Turtle to stop him snoring and sends him to bed. He puts their glasses in the kitchen sink and goes up to his room. Vince is sitting on the edge of his bed.

“E,” he says, not quite looking at him, and Eric steps closer. Vince’s hands are flat on his thighs, rubbing up and down a little nervously. Eric gets what Vince is asking for. They’ve never hooked up like this before — it’s always been casual, never really pre-meditated. Two years ago, they were at a jazz club, Vince studying for his first major role after the Cannes debacle, and he put his hand on Eric’s knee halfway through the night, tapped out the syncopated rhythms against Eric’s leg. His hand slid up higher, and Eric thought, oh, and then, oh yeah, and later that night he barely thought at all when Vince gave him a blowjob back in the safety of Vince’s own bedroom. Since then it had been like that every time — both of them usually loosened by alcohol, their encounters quick, intense, and basically purely sexual.

Vince has never really asked, before. Eric isn’t sure what it means, but tonight, he’ll give him anything. “Yeah,” he says, and closes the door.

When he turns around, he’s not sure what to do. Usually, Vince takes the lead — drags Eric into the bed or shoves him into a chair, or at least strips off his shirt and preens in the way that Eric knows means he wants to be touched. Tonight, though, Vince is just sitting there, quietly, looking past him. He could push Vince over, maybe, or get on his knees, but that doesn’t feel right. Instead, he sits next to him and puts his hand on Vince’s shoulder, and when Vince turns, Eric kisses him. Vince kisses back aggressively, and soon Eric is stretched back on the bed, Vince over him, his kisses frantic and deep.

He tries to go with it, but it’s too fast, too panicky. “Hey -” Eric says, and then tries again, but Vince is holding him down and kissing him breathless, and when he pulls Eric’s shirt it tears a little. That isn’t anything they’ve ever done before. Eric finally shoves Vince over onto his back and hovers above him, panting, one hand pinning Vince’s shoulder to the bed. Vince’s eyes are turned to the side. “Vince,” Eric says, quietly, but Vince doesn’t look at him. “What’s going on?”

Vince shrugs. Eric keeps staring at him, and finally Vince’s eyes flicker back to him. “This could be the last time, huh?”

Eric frowns. “What are you —”

“Those papers,” he says. “I read the warnings and stuff. Some guys — they’re — afterwards, they can’t get it up.” He’s looking away again, and Eric can feel the tension in his shoulders. Vince’s dick is soft against his thigh.

Eric shifts over onto his side but stays close to Vince. “That’s a tiny percentage,” he says. He chose not to bring that part of it to Vince’s attention.

“So is the number of actors who make it out here,” Vince says. “I’ve been the fucking exception my whole life, E.”

“No, you’ve been exceptional,” Eric says. “There’s a difference. You’ve been the best at everything. And this is going to be no different.”

Vince nods, and his eyes close. Eric stares down at him, at his gorgeous caramel skin — tanned carefully for the movie — and his defined pecs — again, for the movie — and this is something else he’s never gotten to do, either, just be here, close, intimate, with Vince. No overnights. Eric looks down at Vince and senses tonight will also be an exception.

“You’re gonna be fine,” Eric says. “And this is definitely not going to be your last time.”

Vince opens one eye, raises his eyebrow. Eric cups his face and kisses him, a good, dirty kiss, and is pleased to feel Vince getting a little hard against his leg when he rubs his thigh against him. “You guarantee, huh?”

“There’s always tomorrow morning,” Eric says, and Vince pulls him down.

 

Eric wakes up with his head on Vince’s chest, and he looks up to see him grinning. “Hey,” he says. He’s kind of sticky and worried about his morning breath, but Vince just keeps smiling.

“Hey,” he says, and then flips Eric onto his back so fast he laughs, startled. “My turn,” Vince says, and he bites Eric’s neck, then licks the spot. He makes a path down Eric’s chest like this, then across his belly, and then rolls him over with sure hands. For a guy who the night before was worried about being impotent, he’s very much in charge now. Eric gasps when Vince enters him, then groans at the forceful pace he sets.

“Quiet,” he urges, his breath coming out in gasps, his head brushing the headboard. “You’re gonna wake the guys.”

Vince pulls almost all the way out, then thrusts so hard Eric does hit the headboard, and Eric hisses, nearly comes. “They’re awake,” Vince says, his voice ragged. “Turtle walked in looking for you.”

Eric curses and Vince drives in again, harder. It doesn’t take Eric long to come, even though he’s still a little weary from the night before, but Vince holds out, really makes it last. When he finally collapses against Eric’s back, Eric says, “Good fucking god, Vince,” and Vince laughs a little.

He nips the juncture of Eric’s shoulder and neck before he pulls away. “I figured we could just make a day of it,” Vince says. “Since the guys already know.”

“A day of sex with you,” Eric says, and he looks over, sees that Vince’s grin is already sliding toward sleepy. Sweat glistens on his tan, perfect collarbones. “Why not.”

They shower, then fuck again, then shower another time before they make it out for lunch. They both eat ravenously while Turtle stares at them, wide-eyed, from across the table. 

“Spit it out, Turtle,” Eric says.

“Is this some kind of weird hormone thing?” 

Vince laughs, and Eric nearly chokes on his cheeseburger. Vince says, “No, we’ve hooked up before,” and shrugs.

“Not a big deal, Turtle, OK?” After a minute, Turtle nods. He leaves the kitchen pretty quickly, though, which is OK with Eric because it gives him a chance to slide his hand into Vince’s shorts, and then to get on his knees before him. Here, he faces a brief quandry, because — yeah, he’s curious. He wants to feel it, to check it out a little. He hears Vince’s breath catch as he moves his hands, lightly, down his shaft, close to his body.

“You can if you want,” Vince says, spreading his legs apart. “I don’t care.”

Eric looks up, and he doesn’t know how he knows — because Vince is a good actor — but he gets immediately that Vince does care. So he shakes his head, and kisses the inside of Vince’s thigh, then takes his cock into his mouth and never touches his balls. He doesn’t want to remember the cancer, here; he doesn’t want that to be a memory he associates with sex with Vince at all.


	3. Chapter 3

By that evening, they’re both too tired to lay more than a hand on each other, so they get dressed and Vince takes them all to the movies. They see the newest action flick out of Paramount, which mostly stars Sara Foster’s legs and Colin Farrell’s arms. Eric wonders if the whole thing is going to put Vince in a bad mood, but he seems to take it all in stride, even laughs along when Turtle makes a joke about Vince’s fling with her. Eric can’t seem to relax enough to watch the movie; he’s more aware than he should be of the casual spread of Vince’s thighs in the seat and his every shift and sigh.  


Afterwards, Vince and Drama hit the bathroom while Eric and Turtle go for the car. “I’d think you’d be in a better mood,” Turtle says as they cross the parking lot. “What’s the matter, E, you jealous?”  


Eric rolls his eyes. “She’s not my type.”  


Turtle shakes his head. “I meant _of_ her.”  


Eric stops and looks over the hood of the car. “Seriously, man,” he says, “it’s not a big deal.”  


“Since when did you ever hook up with somebody and not want to like marry them?” Turtle opens his door, and Eric climbs in back while Turtle takes the driver’s seat.  


“Since Vince,” Eric says. “It’s just a thing we do, sometimes. Do you really need to be an asshole about this?”  


Turtle frowns, then starts the car. “He’s pretty fucking freaked, huh?”  


“Yeah,” Eric says. “Wouldn’t you be?”  


Turtle nods. They pull up in front of the theater, where Drama is trying to horn in on some girl who’s asking for Vince’s autograph. They get their pictures taken and then both slide into the car. “So what next?” Turtle asks.  


Vince shrugs. “Dinner?” Eric suggests.  


Drama says, “Yeah, you need to keep your strength up, bro,” and when Vince turns around and glares at him, he says, “I mean for the kind of exercise you’ve been getting with E.”  


Now Eric glares, but Vince laughs. “Guys, don’t knock it ‘til you’ve tried it,” he says, and winks at Eric before he turns around. “Let’s go to The Palm.”  


  


Vince calls his mother the next morning and takes the phone out to the pool, and after thirty minutes he comes back in and says, “I asked her not to come out. Not a big deal, right?” Eric agrees. He can’t really imagine having Rita around, anyway; it would be endlessly awkward, particularly considering where Vince’s bandages will be. She’s never dealt well with crises.  


That day, Saturday, passes just like normal: dinner, drinks, laying around. Eric ignores the scripts he has to read, but that’s all that’s really amiss. They don’t fuck around at all, either, which doesn’t bother Eric: he can barely sit down without wincing, and Vince is supposed to lay off for twenty-four hours before his sperm donation.  


Sunday afternoon, Ari calls in some favors and gets Vince an appointment at a discreet sperm bank. The guys sit in the empty lobby, and Vince disappears down a clean hall. Turtle says, “Ten bucks says he’s not thinking of you, E.”  


“Jesus, I’ll put twenty on that,” Drama says.  


“Guys, seriously,” Eric says, keeping his voice low, “a, shut the fuck up, and b, of course he’s not.” Eric has never been Vince’s fantasy, and he knows that. He’s the guy Vince comes to when he’s bored, or when he wants a change, or when, apparently, he just doesn’t want to think for a while. That’s not a bad guy to be, and Eric prides himself on having no illusions. They have pretty fucking good sex together, and they’re best friends, and that’s much more than he could’ve ever asked for or expected. He’s not pushing for more.  


When Vince comes back down the hall, he has a fake smile on, a nurse burbling at his elbow. They walk to the car, and Turtle says, “So who’d you think about?”  


Vince says, “I don’t know, they had some posters,” and they leave it at that.  


Eric can see Vince is sinking into nerves, so he makes a few calls and gets them Lakers tickets for that night. Not courtside, but good enough, and after the game they hit a bar until Eric says, “OK, uh, we oughtta go now.”  


“What? It’s early,” Turtle protests.  


Eric nods. “Vince can’t eat or drink after midnight,” he says. “And we’ve got to be at the hospital early. Come on.”  


“Sorry, guys,” Vince says as they wait on the car. “Buzzkill, I know.”  


“It’s fine,” Turtle says.  


“Yeah, I wasn’t getting anywhere fast, anyway,” Drama says, putting one hand on Vince’s shoulder.  


At the house, they all split toward their different bedrooms, though Turtle gives Eric a questioning glance when he doesn’t follow Vince toward the master suite. “Give it a rest,” Eric says, and goes to his own room.  


He doesn’t sleep well, which makes the alarm clock’s 6:30 call that much worse. Vince looks a little pale, but he says he’s fine, just hungry, and they all skip breakfast in solidarity and drive him to the hospital.  


Vince is taken back to get prepared and Eric, Turtle, and Drama sit in a small waiting room just for family. Drama is twitchy enough that Eric wants to throttle him; instead, he goes into the hall to call Ari. “They’re getting him all ready.”  


“You want me to drop in?”  


“Nah, I think they’re gonna knock him out pretty soon,” Eric says. “Just wanted to keep you updated.”  


“OK. Good. You’ll call, as soon as —”  


“As soon as he’s out, yeah,” Eric says. “Hey, what did Shauna say?”  


“Uh, yeah, about that,” Ari says, and Eric presses his hand to his mouth. This can’t be good. “It’s gonna be in the papers today, probably. Someone from the movie leaked that he’s dropping out. She’s got a release prepared.”  


“Christ,” Eric says. “What’s it say?”  


“Usual stuff. Asks for privacy, that kind of thing.”  


Eric sighs. “If only that worked. Should we expect press here?”  


“Definitely at the house,” Ari says. “Look, when he’s feeling better — an interview would be a good idea. Just show the world that he’s still OK, you know?”  


“Show people he can still make movies, you mean,” Eric says. He wants to argue, but he’s too tired and too worried. “I’ll talk to you later, Ari.” He hangs up and just stands in the hall for a second, letting himself think about the part of this all that he’s been ignoring. There’s a chance that Vince isn’t going to be up to working any time soon, after this. Surgery is going to take a toll physically, and probably mentally. They were counting on the payday from _Keyword_ to finance their next project, and now that’s probably pretty shaky, too. Eric realizes he’s going to have to call Marvin soon and figure out how to keep them afloat. He’ll get a job and sell the other guys into slavery if he has to, just to make sure Vince doesn’t get rushed back to work before he’s ready.  


The same pretty nurse from their earlier meeting with McNaight walks up and stops in front of the door. “Eric, right?”  


“Yeah,” he says. “Uh, hi —”  


“Claire,” she says. “If you’d like to see him, you can go in now.”  


“He’s all ready?”  


“They’re just waiting on the anesthesiologist,” she says. Her smile is patient and kind. “He’s a little nervous, I think he’d like company.”  


Eric nods. “Thanks.” He starts to follow her, then realizes he’s leaving the other guys behind. “Hold on,” he says, and turns back to collect Turtle and Drama. “You guys be nice,” Eric lectures as they walk down the hall. “Supportive, remember?”  


“Jesus, E, you want us to each get one cut off in sympathy?” Turtle asks, then glances at Claire. “Sorry.”  


“I’ve heard worse strategies,” she says, and smiles and holds open a curtain for them.  


Vince is in a hospital gown, with a white blanket tucked up around him, his head resting on a thin pillow. He blinks when they come in, and his face is full of fear for just a second. “Guys, hey,” he says, and the smile he pastes on is weak.  


“Hey, bro,” Drama says. He grips the hand that Vince holds up in a tight, quick shake. “How you doing?”  


“Just relaxing,” Vince says. “Not much else I can do.”  


“You’re gonna be fine,” Turtle says. “Maybe they’ll get in there and see there’s no problem at all, you know?”  


Vince laughs. “Sure, Turtle. Thanks.”  


Turtle nods, and it’s such a frantic move that Eric takes him by the shoulder. “All right, give me a minute, guys,” he says.  


Turtle nods again, whispers something like good luck, and flees. Drama kisses Vince’s forehead in a big, dramatic way, says, “That’s from Ma, all right?” and then leaves as fast as Turtle. Lightweights, Eric thinks, even though his hands are feeling pretty shaky.  


“So how are you?” he says.  


Vince shrugs. “I want to go home,” he says. “I suppose it’s too late for that, huh?”  


His tone is light, but Eric can tell he’s not really joking, that if Eric would say it was OK, he’d get up right now and walk out. “Yeah, a little,” Eric says instead. He takes Vince’s hand into his, a loose, friendly grip. “You want me to hang out though, for a while?”  


“Yeah,” Vince says, “I guess.”  


“Turtle thinks you should ask if you can keep it,” Eric says. “In a jar, or something.”  


Vince laughs — an actual laugh. “Maybe set it on my bedside?”  


“I thought in the living room. Great conversation starter, you know. Plus, after you get that Oscar —”  


“Get it bronzed, maybe,” Vince says, nodding. “Yeah.”  


The curtain slides open, and McNaight is standing there, along with another gray-haired doctor and Claire. Vince’s other hand has come up to cover Eric’s, and now he squeezes.  


“Vincent, we’re all ready for you now,” McNaight says. “Shall we get this going? You’ll be back with your friend very soon.”  


Vince clears his throat. “OK. I guess.” He looks up at Eric, and his patented expressive eyes are working overtime: fear, anxiety, maybe some affection. Eric just nods, and squeezes his hands, then pats his chest.  


“See you in a bit, pal,” he says. “And hurry up, I’m cooped up with Turtle and Drama.”  


Vince nods and smiles, then blinks. The emotions clear away, and he looks up at the doctors. “All right.”  


Eric goes into hall and watches them roll Vince away, and it’s one of the hardest things he’s ever done. Claire puts one hand on his arm. “He’s going to be fine,” she says.  


He glances over. “You’re not going with them?”  


She shakes her head. “I’m not a surgical nurse.” Her smile is very kind. “It should take about 45 minutes. Do you need anything?”  


He shrugs, still staring down the hall. “I don’t know,” he says. “Man, just 45 minutes, huh? That’s weird. Seems like it should take longer, or something.” He manages, finally, to look away, once Vince is through the double doors.  


“Come on,” Claire says. “I’ll take you back to your friends.”  


  


Vince gets through the surgery just fine, which Eric didn’t even realize he was worried about until McNaight shows up in their waiting room. He’s put in a room not too long after that, and Claire tells them they need to get him up and walking around as soon as possible. Vince blinks groggily up at Eric when he walks in. Eric takes his limp, cool hand. There’s an ice pack on his groin. “See, just fine, buddy,” he says.  


“Sure,” Vince murmurs, and closes his eyes again.  


They manage to get him up after about an hour, and he looks perversely small in his hospital gown. Eric’s glad when they get him changed into the sweats they brought from home. The hall has a few other patients spread around, but they all pretty much keeps their heads down. Vince winces every time he steps to his left. His grip on Eric’s arm is very sharp. They take turns helping him walk a lap around the floor, and Claire checks on them frequently, monitoring Vince’s vitals and all of that. Around 5, McNaight comes by and takes a look at the thin incision near Vince’s hipbone.  


“Looks OK,” he says, and Vince pulls his sweatshirt back down. “How do you feel?”  


“Sore.”  


McNaight nods. “We’ll get you something to take care of that. You’ll also want to keep ice on it, both the incision and your scrotum, to reduce the swelling.” Eric barely manages not to wince; Turtle flinches like he’s been hit. McNaight hands them some post-surgical instructions for care of the incision and emphasizes that Vince can’t do any heavy lifting.  


“No problem,” Vince says. Eric stands to help Vince sit up. “So that’s it?”  


“That is it,” McNaight says. “When we have results, we’ll call. Please get some rest.”  


Turtle goes to get the car and Drama pushes Vince’s wheelchair to a side door, where they’re exiting so as to miss any overzealous paparazzi. “Bet you’re ready to get out of this place,” Drama says, drumming his hands on the wheelchair handles.  


Vince shrugs. “Feels like, I don’t know. Too soon? I was unconscious like five hours ago.”  


“Closer to seven,” Eric says, resting one hand on Vince’s shoulder. He’s nice and warm now, and Eric finds it comforting. “I’m sure they wouldn’t let you go home if they didn’t think you were ready.”  


“Plus, we’re gonna take excellent care of you, bro,” Drama says. “I’m making your favorite tonight, the linguine with clams —”  


“Uhh,” Vince says, and holds his stomach. “Johnny, I appreciate it, man, I do, but — my appetite isn’t going to be much.”  


Eric watches Drama, sees a flash of disappointment on his face and then something almost tender. “No problem,” Drama says. “We’ll do soup instead. We can do the pasta later in the week.”  


Vince nods. Their Escalade rolls to a stop, and Eric opens the passenger’s door. He offers Vince a hand to get out of the chair, and Vince leans close to him for a second while he gets his balance. “OK,” he says, and Eric stands behind him as he eases into the car.  


Eric helps him out at home, too, and Vince groans. “This fucking hurts, man,” he whispers, and Eric tightens his arm around Vince’s waist.  


“We’ll get you in bed,” he says, and Vince swallows and clings to him as they go inside.  


They get him settled into bed, but the grimace doesn’t leave his face. Eric gets him a new dose of pain killers — Oxycodone, the heavy stuff — and knows it’s kicked in when Vince’s face goes a little slack. “You OK? You need anything?”  


There’s ice in the icemaker but they’re out of Ziploc bags, so Eric sends Turtle out for some, and in the meantime, finds a bag of frozen peas and another of corn, wraps them in paper towels, and takes them to Vince. He helps him tuck them where they belong and watches Vince sigh, a mix of pain and relief. Eric can’t help his glance between Vince’s legs, but he can’t see much; there are no cuts or scars, just a general redness over his ball sac where the ice has been kept. Really, Eric can’t even tell a difference; he wonders if that’s partly swelling.  


He gets Vince a glass of water and reads the directions on the pills; he can have another one in four hours. He’ll stay on top of it. “Don’t let Turtle get those,” Vince says, settling carefully back into his pillows.  


“I’ll guard them with my life,” Eric promises. He feels a strange urge to pull the blankets up around Vince or to touch his forehead or something, and instead, he turns away. “Call if you need anything, OK?”  


“OK,” Vince agrees, and Eric’s pretty sure he’s asleep before he’s even out the door.  


  


Vince surfaces that night, cranky and very sore, barely able to walk. He lets Drama fuss over him — setting up a nice satellite bed on the couch, bringing him ice and a bowl of soup and more to drink, all of that. Turtle picks the channel, some weird reality sports show that he and Drama are hooked on. Eric can’t get into it, but reading a script would feel like bad taste. He’s surprised when Vince reaches out and taps his ankle. “You should call that nurse,” he says.  


Eric sits up. “Why? You feeling bad? Sick? What’s going on?”  


Vince rolls his eyes. “I meant, that nurse today, she was cute. You should call her.”  


“What?”  


“She was flirting with you all afternoon.”  


“She was checking on you,” Eric says. “It was her job.”  


Vince closes his eyes. “E, she brought you coffee. You think that’s in her job description? And I know she gave you her number.”  


“That was just in case anything went wrong,” Eric argues, but he’s starting to see Vince’s point. She wrote it not on the official forms but on a small piece of notepaper that she handed him in the doorway as they were leaving. Office and cell.  


“Whatever, you want to be oblivious, that’s fine,” Vince says, settling into his pillow.  


The next morning, he limps out for breakfast, wearing loose sport shorts as recommended by the post-care instructions and holding another bag of ice to his incision. Turtle’s still sleeping, but Drama has made eggs and hashbrowns and toast, and he makes Vince sit down and relax while he serves him first. Eric is actually grateful for Drama’s presence, because he asks all of the questions Eric wants to ask — how Vince is feeling, whether he’s terribly sore, whether he’s had any other feelings down there — and in so doing absorbs all of the glares and sighs and fuck-offs that Eric would usually get. Drama finally gets tired of being crabbed at and splits to take a shower, and Vince looks across at Eric with an aggrieved glare.  


“I’m not asking,” Eric says, shrugging, looking down at his eggs.  


“Good.”  


“I assume you’ll tell me if you need anything.”  


“I’ll call, remember?” Vince says, shaking his head. “Hey, you call that nurse yet?”  


“Jesus,” Eric says. He looks across the table. Vince doesn’t look well — he has faint purple half-moons under his eyes, and he winces every time he shifts in his chair. Eric wants to get up and get him a pillow, or an extra pain pill. “Maybe I’m not interested.”  


Vince scoffs. “She’s totally your type. Cute, smart, probably dependable. And into you.”  


“It’s bad timing.”  


“Why, you got someone else you’re seeing?” Vince asks, and Eric shakes his head. “Then what, because as far as I can tell, you have nothing but free time on your hands for a while.”  


Eric sighs. He pushes his potatoes around with his fork. “Look,” he says, quietly, “with everything that’s going on, I don’t want to get involved right now, OK?”  


“Oh, huh-uh,” Vince says, and Eric looks up and sees Vince push back his plate. “No. You don’t get to use me as an excuse.”  


“Vince,” Eric says. “This is — you’re going through something. I mean, how am I even supposed to think about that stuff, when you’re —”  


Vince shakes his head. “No. No way, E. This is not that kind of story, all right?”  


Eric blinks. “What kind of story is that?”  


“You don’t get to fall in love with me just because I’m sick,” Vince says. “Just like I don’t get to fall for you because you’re taking care of me.”  


Eric laughs involuntarily. Fall in love? he thinks. Who said anything about that? “So what kind of story is this, then?”  


Vince shrugs. “The usual,” he says, taking a small bite of eggs. “Triumph of good over evil. I’m sure we’ll all be better people at the end.”  


“Undoubtedly,” Eric says.  


“And you should call that nurse.”  


Eric looks up and waits until Vince meets his eyes. He looks serious, like all he wants in the world is Eric’s happiness. “All right,” Eric says, shrugging. “We’ll see.”  


“Good.”  



	4. Chapter 4

So the next day, while Vince lounges on the couch and makes dramatic facial expressions, Eric calls and, after some stammering and an excuse about Vince’s medication, asks Claire if she’d like to get some coffee.  


“That’d be great,” she says. “How about this afternoon?”  


At 3, while Vince naps under the supervision of Drama and Turtle, Eric meets Claire at coffee shop not too far from the hospital. She’s waiting when he arrives, dressed in a V-neck blouse and skinny jeans. Her hair, which was swept up in the hospital, now falls in shoulder-length reddish waves. She smiles brightly and waves him over after he gets his coffee. They get through the typical small talk — what he does, what she does (she’s been with McNaight for five years, since graduating from a specialty course in nursing, and is considering getting a higher degree, something that would allow her to prescribe medication), where they’re both from (she’s originally from Northern California), all the basics. Vince is right — she’s exactly what he’d usually go for in a girl, but he feels like he’s just going through the motions until she finishes her coffee.  


“I have a shift starting in half an hour,” Claire says. “I should probably get going.”  


“You work a lot of weird times?” he asks.  


“Actually — no,” she says, and Eric notices she’s blushing. “After you called, I traded with a girl who works the evening shift at the hospital. I’m usually only in the clinic eight to five.” She laughs, just a little. “I just — I didn’t want to put this off.”  


Eric nods and smiles over at her. “I’m glad,” he says, because it’s the thing to say. “And, hey, this was fun. I mean, good to get to know you.”  


“Yeah, I’m glad you called,” she says. “I’ll admit I was a little surprised you called — I didn’t think you were paying attention. I mean, I know you were pretty concerned about Vince.”  


“Oh.” Eric rubs his neck, feeling a little flush of embarrassment. “Actually, it was Vince who noticed,” he admits, and Claire nods.  


“I wanted — I just want to say, I mean — “ She sighs, and he realizes she’s actually flustered. There’s still a flush of pink across her cheeks. It’s pretty cute. “I know how much he means to you. I see a lot of guys go through this, working for McNaight, and not a lot of them have such a good support system.” She looks up at him through her lashes. “It says something about you, that you care about your friends.”  


“I’ve known him basically my whole life,” Eric says.  


“How’s he doing?”  


He shrugs. “Sore, but OK. Waiting on the test results.”  


“That can be really hard, I know.” She shifts her empty cup from one hand to the other. “Look, Eric, I’ll be honest with you. I’m interested in seeing you — maybe on an actual date, even — but I get that this is kind of a weird way to meet. I know you’re going through a lot right now, with your friend and everything, so — if it’s too weird —”  


Eric thinks about Vince saying _this isn’t that kind of story_ and he makes himself smile. She’s really a sweet girl. “You know, I was just thinking, an actual date might be nice.”  


“Yeah,” she says, grinning broad and bright and sweet. “Good. Great!”  


They set up a date for the coming week, the night after Vince is scheduled to get his results from McNaight. “And I’ll probably see you when we go in, right?”  


“Probably.” She kisses his cheek as they leave, and he watches her walk down the block, then flips open his phone. He sees he missed a call from Vince, and dials him back.  


Drama answers. “He’s asleep,” he says. “He was having some kind of weird pain in his chest.”  


“ _Chest pain_?” Eric says, and realizes he’s getting stares from the people around him.  


“Relax, we called the doc, he said it’s normal, it’s like referred pain from the whole procedure. But he’s sleeping now, I’m not gonna get him up.”  


“Jesus,” Eric says. His hand shakes as he unlocks the car. “OK. I’m on my way home.”  


At the house, Vince is sleeping in his own room. Eric goes in anyway, being very quiet, and takes a seat in the armchair that’s nestled into his bay window. He stays there, flipping through a magazine and just keeping an eye out, until Vince wakes for dinner.  


“Good date?” he asks as Eric helps him out of bed.  


“Yeah, good,” Eric says, helping him limp to the kitchen. “You were right.”  


“I always am about stuff like this.” He winces even as he’s trying to smile. “I’m very wise.”  


Eric wants to ask about the pain earlier, but he doesn’t want to worry Vince. He doesn’t want to make anything worse. So he says, instead, “Yeah, wise and humble, that’s you,” and gets some ice and more pain medication, then lets Vince spend the next hour teasing details out of him, all the while thinking he should never leave his side again.  


  


Monday morning they go to McNaight’s office again to get the results from Vince’s surgery. Eric sees Claire once, briefly, from a distance as they’re being led to an exam room, and he waves and she waves but she looks busy. He’s a little relieved, because he wants to keep his focus on Vince. McNaight first takes a look at Vince’s incision and says it looks fine, asks him about his pain and a few other bodily functions Eric didn’t really need to know about. Then he sits down and says, “So I have your results and we should discuss them.”  


Vince nods. Eric is leaning against the exam table Vince is sitting on, and Vince grips his shoulder. They haven’t really talked about the possible outcomes here, and Eric realizes this could all be about to get much, much worse.  


“What we found was good,” McNaight says.  


“Not cancer?” Vince asks, his voice nearly a squeak.  


“Definitely cancer,” McNaight says. “But Stage I. Seminoma. Aggressive if not treated, but now, highly curable.”  


Vince’s hand flexes on Eric’s shoulder. “I have cancer and this is good news.”  


“This is a highly treatable stage. The first step is complete; we have removed the testicle.”  


“There’s a second step?” Eric asks, feeling staggered. He somehow thought — well, he hadn’t really thought past this surgery. What he wants to say is, No more.  


“Step two, you see someone new. Dr. Gary Graber at Cedars. He is the best oncologist in town, and he will talk through your options.”  


“Options like…”  


“Surgery or chemotherapy. I think chemotherapy more likely. These treatments — they won’t be fun, you will not enjoy them, but at the end of it you’ll have no lasting effects.”  


“Except for the part where you took out one of my testicles.”  


McNaight tips his head to the side as an acknowledgment. “You could meet with him tomorrow and begin treatment right after.”  


“So wait,” Eric says, “if it hasn’t spread and it’s all good news, then why do this chemo thing?”  


“In case we’ve missed anything,” McNaight says. “In case there a few tiny cells, somewhere, are wanting to start their own colony. This will end that. A year from now, you come back and I say, this is fine, everything looks good. You don’t do this, maybe you come back in a year and I say, there’s nothing more I can do. You understand?”  


Eric can hear Vince swallow. “OK,” Vince says. “Let’s see the guy.”  


In the car, Vince leans back until his head is hanging over the seat. One of his hands is flat against his lower stomach, where his incision is, and at first Eric thinks he’s hurting. “Vince?”  


“Cancer,” Vince says, and clamps his eyes shut. “Oh, fuck,” he says, “fuck, fuck, fuck, E.”  


“It’s OK,” Eric says, gripping Vince’s leg. “We’re gonna get through this.”  


“I don’t wanna be dead in a year.”  


“You’re gonna be fine in a year,” Eric says. “You’re gonna be fine in two months, you heard him.”  


Vince nods. He presses the heels of his hands to his eyes, then nods again and sits forward. “OK,” he says, “OK.”  


They’re halfway home before Eric realizes he didn’t talk to Claire at all on his way out.  


  


That afternoon, they go to Cedars and meet with Dr. Graber. His office is high in the Cedars-Sinai medical complex, but although the furniture is nice and the diplomas impressive, the room is pretty small and the windows overlook the parking lot. “Wow, what a view,” Vince says, easing into one of the wingback chairs while they wait for Graber to arrive. He’s still clearly in pain, though he doesn’t complain too much. “Guess fame doesn’t buy you much here, huh?”  


“Just the best urologic oncologist on the West Coast,” Eric says, turning around. Vince is wearing an old black Ramones T-shirt and green fatigue pants. His hair is messy and his hands won’t stay still, even when Eric takes the chair next to his and clamps one hand over his forearm. “You ready to meet this guy?”  


“Yeah, I guess,” Vince says. “I feel like I should have a medical degree from this or something. I mean, for my next role, I could play a doctor, easy.”  


“I’ll keep an eye out for the urologist with a heart of gold script,” Eric says, and Vince smiles. It’s a nervous smile, but it’s something.  


The smile disappears completely when Graber arrives. “Hey, how are we doing?” he asks. Graber’s a young guy, 40ish, trim like a tennis player, with a full head of blonde hair. He looks like a guy who probably drives a Bentley and bangs supermodels — not that Eric should cast judgments, he thinks, looking over at Vince. Today, though, Vince doesn’t look like a movie star. Vince looks like just a guy, a scared, not-quite-well-yet guy, sitting awkwardly in a too-small doctor’s office, trying to act brave in the face of bad news. Eric keeps his hand on Vince’s arm and gives him a little squeeze, and Vince looks over at him, clearly surprised and, after a moment, clearly grateful.  


Graber doesn’t pull out a chart, which Eric likes, but his smile is too weirdly bright, his manner too chipper. Vince is so tense he’s practically trembling, and this guy looks like a jack-in-the-box. Eric gets the idea that Vince wants him to do the talking, so he does, asking the what-happens-now questions that he’s sure they both want to hear. Graber lays out some options: major surgery, radiation, a course of chemotherapy, or “watchful waiting.” Once he mentions the possibility of sterility, Vince takes radiation off the table. “The chemotherapy has right at a hundred percent cure rate,” Graber says, which makes it Eric’s immediate favorite. A hundred-percent, he thinks. A sure thing.  


“And the surgery?”  


“Also very successful,” Graber says, spreading his hands out. “But it’s major surgery. More than what you’ve been through. And the risk of permanent sexual dysfunction is higher.”  


Vince clears his throat. “Or I could wait and see?”  


“Some guys get lucky,” Graber says. “You’d come in for tests every month, we’d take a look, and if we don’t find anything, you’re free. We do that for about five years, and if it doesn’t come back, congratulations.”  


“How likely is that?”  


He shrugs. “Absolutely no way of knowing.”  


“And if it does come back?” Eric asks.  


“Then the chemotherapy options become a lot harder.”  


He outlines a plan of chemotherapy: a single dose of something called Carboplatin, administered over one day. “One day, one dose. Clinical trials show it’s just as effective as a longer radiation treatment. We’ll follow up every week for a while, then give you a big final check about a month out to make sure everything’s OK. After that, you’re going to want to see McNaight or your other guy every month for a year.”  


“Chemo — there’s side effects, right?”  


Graber nods. “With a single dose like this, it’s going to be a little intense at first, yes, but — it’s a one-time deal.”  


Vince looks over, and Eric nods. This seems like the only choice. “OK,” Vince says. “When’s kickoff?”  


Vince agrees to start in a week, when he’s more healed from his surgery. On the way home, they don’t really talk. Eric wants to push him, wants to ask what he’s thinking about the meeting, the treatments, all of that, but he doesn’t want to make Vince think about it if he doesn’t have to. Vince, after all, is the master of _not thinking about it_ ; when he wants to talk, he’ll talk. So he lets Vince turn up the stereo and worries enough for both of them.  


Claire and Eric go to dinner that night even though Eric doesn’t want to leave Vince, who is sulky and frightened and a little pathetic, home alone with Turtle. “Just go,” Turtle says, when Eric is hedging by the door. “If you get laid, at least we’ll have something new to talk about.”  


They go casual Mexican, and Eric pays. Claire is a relief, actually, asks about Vince’s test results and then spends most of the meal helping him decipher what it all means.  


“The chemo can be rough,” she says. “He’ll be sick, he’ll lose some weight, he’s gonna be really tired. But the single-dose thing is easier than the stuff Lance Armstrong went through and he won the Tour that next year.”  


Eric tries to smile. “Maybe we should buy him a bike,” he says. He’s been pushing the same taco around for half an hour. “He’s hardly ever really been sick. I mean, he’s just that guy — he had mono in high school, but it basically just made him tired, none of the worse stuff with it. He never gets colds, I don’t think he’s so much as sprained an ankle since he left New York, and now this.”  


“It’s a much more common disease than people think, particularly for younger men,” Claire says, and then she shakes her head and laughs. “Wow, I sound like a brochure, huh?”  


“It’s OK,” Eric says. He looks up and smiles — doesn’t even have to make himself, really. “Thank you,” he says. “This has been the lamest date ever, I’m sure, but it’s been — it’s really meant a lot, to me, to hear your advice on things.”  


Claire covers one of his hands with her own. “Eric, it’s my pleasure. And it hasn’t all been business, right?”  


“Not all,” he agrees. He draws away to sign the check, then puts his hand on her back to guide her out of the restaurant. “You, uh, need to get right home?” he asks.  


“Not right away,” she says. “I’m off tomorrow.” She turns to face him, and her smile is so pretty, so kind, that he feels terrible for not feeling, well, anything. He can’t do more than suggest they take a drive. “Let’s walk,” she says. “There’s a bar a few blocks down, they have a good porter on tap.”  


OK, he thinks, taking her hand. Vince is right. My kind of girl.  


He doesn’t have much to report when he gets back to the house, other than a pretty encouraging kiss good-night and further promises of getting together over the weekend. That turns out to be OK, because the guys are engaged in a battle-to-the-death in front of the Wii. Vince turns his head but not his eyes when Eric walks in. “You want to play the winner?” he asks.  


Eric smells pot in the air, sees beer bottles on the coffee table. He wants to whack Turtle upside the head, or maybe Vince, because he’s not supposed to have any of this stuff even now that he’s on the milder pain killers. Then again, for the first time in two weeks, Vince looks happy, relaxed, carefree. He’s had a good night, Eric’s had a good night, and if the price they pay is breaking some rules, well, Eric’s fine with that. He can let it slide.  


“Sure,” he says. “But let me get a beer first, all right?”  



	5. Chapter 5

Vince’s chemo treatment is on Monday. It’s a little anti-climatic: Eric expects a ward full of bald-headed children, maybe some wicked needles, other terrible machines. Instead, the room they’re directed to is basically like any other patient room, except with two large recliners instead of beds, and a television bolted to the wall. “Take the chair on the end,” the nurse says. “We can curtain you off pretty good, this way.”  


Eric tests the chair by squeezing the back, nervous, not sure what else to do. He looks out the windows and onto the parking lot; outside it’s warmer than it should be, and he thinks he can see waves of heat rising from the asphalt. His car isn’t out there; Turtle dropped them off, and has promised to stay within the vicinity to pick them up when Eric calls. He didn’t want to come, and Eric actually respects his honesty on that point. He’d rather not see Vince throwing up over everything, either, but he doesn’t feel he has a choice. Drama is, for once, working.  


Graber walks in looking sunshiny as ever and runs through exactly what’s going to happen, though in such cheery medical jargon that Eric has no idea what he’s really saying. In the end, the visuals answer all the questions: As Graber’s talking about the delivery methods, a nurse carries in two clear bags of fluid and hooks them on an IV stand near the bed. Graber looks between them, and then does the first thing that Eric finds endearing. “It’s actually going to be better if I don’t spell out the possible side-effects for you, I think,” he says, looking at Vince. And though Eric wants to hear every detail, every possibility, he’s relieved. Vince is highly susceptible to suggestion, after all. “They’re just possibilities. You have a pretty strong stomach, usually?”  


Vince shrugs. “I’m lactose intolerant,” he murmurs, and Eric nearly laughs.  


Graber cracks a smile. “Well, there’s no milk in here, I promise,” he says. “In fact, right now we’re just going to start you with fluids, then some stuff to steady your stomach, before we get the real drug going. Why don’t you take a seat, we’ll see if we can’t get you out of here before lunch.” Then he tips his head, just barely, and Eric gets it and nods and feels even more grateful. “I’ll be back to check on you, all right? Alice will get you all set up.”  


“Come on, honey,” Alice says, patting the chair. She’s a large woman with a big smile and a nice, pleasantly teasing voice. “Made it up special for you.”  


Eric doesn’t push. He just rests his hand between Vince’s shoulder blades. “Just for me, huh?” Vince says.  


“Best seat in the ward.” Alice plumps the pillow dramatically.  


Vince looks over at Eric, and Eric makes himself smile. “Flip you for it?” he says, and Vince smirks and looks down.  


“OK, OK,” he says, and crosses to the chair. As he’s settling in, and Alice is making a request about which sleeve to roll up, Eric points to the hall.  


“I’ll be right back,” he says, making sure to meet Vince’s eyes, then slips out.  


Graber is standing at the nearby nurse’s station, making a note. He turns as Eric approaches. “If he’s nervous already, it won’t help him to know this stuff,” Graber says, “but it might help you, later today.”  


“Yeah,” Eric agrees. “So what’s going to happen?”  


“He may not feel anything on the first day, but by tomorrow some nausea is pretty standard. We’ll send you home with some meds for that.” He finishes his note and closes the chart. “Fatigue for several days after that, usually worst about 10 days after, maybe two weeks. Loss of appetite. Decrease in sex drive.”  


“Hair loss?” Eric asks.  


Graber shrugs. “That’s not a given with this dosage — just seems to depend on the person.” Eric takes a deep breath. He feels like he should be writing things down, moreso as Graber goes on. “Sensitivity to the sun can be a problem, even once he’s feeling better. We’ll give you a list of warnings — no tanning, no drugs, probably better to stay away from alcohol. ”  


“There’s some kind of interaction?”  


Graber shakes his head. “People get dehydrated, and they land themselves in the hospital that way. Best thing you can do for him is make sure he’s drinking. Water and other clear liquids are going to be best; tea will feel good on his throat. If he doesn’t tolerate milk usually, then it’s a definite no-no now. Any other allergies?”  


Eric shakes his head, then pauses. “Strawberries,” he says, and Graber nods.  


“Then you know what to stay away from.” He hands Eric a business card. “My pager’s on there. If he runs a fever over 100, if he starts to feel a lot of joint pain or gets a rash, if at any point he’s not able to get out of bed because of fatigue — and I don’t mean he doesn’t want to, but if he can’t lift the blanket, can’t move his legs — that’s stuff I need to know right away.” Eric realizes Graber looks ten times more serious, more doctor-like, than he did in the room. He’s glad he’s seeing this face instead of Vince. Graber frowns, and somehow it’s a strangely caring expression. “I wish I could tell you exactly how it’s going to go. But here’s what I can say — we have some drugs that work pretty well now to counteract a lot of these symptoms. We’ll see how he’s doing when it’s time to leave — and we’ll keep him for a couple of hours — and maybe I can prescribe something then to help.”  


“Thank you,” Eric says, shaking his hand.  


“We’ll need to see him again in a week, sooner if he’s really feeling bad. Gotta keep an eye on his white counts with this stuff. Call if you need anything, all right?” Graber says, and they part ways.  


Alice is still in Vince’s room, leaning over his arm, as Eric walks in. “There, see, all done,” she says, and Vince blinks.  


“OK, you’re right, not so bad,” he says, and she smiles.  


“Did I tell you?” She snaps off her rubber gloves. There’s a thin plastic tube running from some tape on Vince’s forearm up to the IV bags. “Champion of the needle stick,”  


Vince looks at Eric. “So now what?”  


“Now we just wait,” Eric says. He reaches into his jacket pocket. “I brought cards.”  


“And I’ll get you a blanket,” Alice says, “because the fluids we’re giving you are cold, going in.”  


She’s right about that; Vince actually starts to shiver during their second hand of Blackjack. Then he has to go to the bathroom. The first time, it’s no big deal; the third time in an hour he gets up to pee, though, he’s blushing.  


“They’re pumping you full of ice water, basically,” Eric says when Vince apologizes, settling back into his chair. “What’d you expect?”  


He shrugs. Eric shirks his jacket and gives it to him. That gets them through a change of the IV bag (this time to the anti-nausea drug) and another dozen hands, then Vince says, “Let’s take a break, you mind?”  


“No, sure,” Eric says. He watches Vince trying to organize the cards in front of him and realizes this is more than the chills. Vince is moving slowly, and his face is a little pale. “I’ve got it,” Eric says, sweeping the cards up and pulling the little rolling table away. Vince nods. He’s sitting up awkwardly, his body half-turned toward Eric, his eyes on the muted television. Eric pushes the cards back into their box. He can hear Vince swallow.  


“You wanna watch TV?” Vince asks. His words sound strange, almost slurred.  


“Sounds good.” Eric reaches out and touches his shoulder. “Lay back, all right?”  


After a moment, Vince nods, and draws himself completely up on the chair, then reclines. He turns on his side, facing Eric, and Eric doesn’t miss that his arms cross over his stomach. “You want another blanket?” he asks.  


“OK,” Vince murmurs, his eyes already closed.  


He meets Alice in the hall. “I was just coming to check on you,” she says. “How’s my boy?”  


“Cold, and I think feeling sick,” Eric says, and Alice clucks.  


“Already, huh? Well, let’s get a blanket and then check this all out.”  


They carry two thin blankets fresh from a warmer into the room, and Eric drops his over Vince and gives his shoulder a squeeze. “You feeling bad, honey?” Alice asks, looking at the monitors.  


“Just weird,” Vince says. “Kind of dizzy.”  


“That’s the anti-nausea stuff. Not so unusual.”  


Eric barely catches himself from saying what he’s thinking: if the stuff that’s supposed to keep him from getting sick is making him feel shitty, what’s the real stuff gonna do?  


“I’m a little cold,” Vince says, which Eric can tell is understatement. His jaw is clenched, his hands tucked together.  


Alice snugs the blanket she’s carrying around Vince. “Well, you look pretty hot to me,” she says, and Vince smiles without opening his eyes. “I’ll get you something to drink. Maybe some hot tea?”  


“Sure,” Vince says. “Thank you.”  


“Yeah, thank you,” Eric says. He wishes he were the one who’d thought of the tea; he wishes there was something he could do. After Alice leaves, he sits carefully on the very edge of his chair, looking at Vince, then the IV bag, then back. The bag is almost empty.  


“E,” Vince murmurs.  


“Yeah? You OK?”  


“Stop staring.”  


Vince has one eyelid cracked open just a sliver, and Eric shakes his head. All right, pal, he thinks. He can play along. He sits back, finds the remote, concentrates on the TV. “So what do you want to watch?”  


“Something stupid,” Vince says, and so Eric surfs until one of the _Lethal Weapon_ movies comes up. He knows he’s found the right thing when Vince’s mouth briefly turns up in a smirk.  


Alice brings the tea. “Feeling pretty groggy?” she asks, and Vince nods. “Yeah, the anti-emetic really knocks some people out.”  


He sits up and sips the tea, holding it in both hands and keeping the blankets up around him, and Alice changes the IV bag again. This time, she wears thick rubber gloves to manage the bag, and Eric tries not to think about what it means that the drug is so strong she can’t touch it, but it’s going into Vince’s veins.  


“Just about another hour,” she says. “You tell me or your friend if you start to feel worse, OK?”  


Vince doesn’t complain about anything, but Eric watches him out of the corner of his eye, and sees in every move — or lack of movement — the signs of discomfort. After an hour, Alice removes the IV line and tells Vince to try and get some rest. Vince closes his eyes and seems to drift to sleep for a while, but Eric sees his fingers twitch, watches him flinch just slightly when a house explodes on screen.  


When Graber comes in and says, “How’re we feeling?” Vince’s eyes open without hesitation or surprise.  


“Tired,” he says.  


Graber nods and makes some kind of note in his chart. “Any nausea? Alice said you were having some lightheadedness.”  


“Just kind of out of it,” Vince says, and Eric looks across at Graber, meets his eyes so he understands: this is all bravado. Vince is miserable. Eric wonders if maybe Vince will puke on Graber, and tries to remind himself that wouldn’t be a good thing. The truth is, though, Eric’s feeling pretty hostile toward the whole place, toward the doctor who still looks unhassled and tan, toward the cheery nurse, toward the drugs that have finished dripping into Vince’s veins.  


But Graber just nods, then dives into a string of doctorly questions. “Any itching near the IV site, rash anywhere? Fever?”  


“Cold, mostly,” Vince says.  


“We’ll take your temperature here, before you leave,” Graber says, “but some chills are pretty normal. Any confusion?” He directs this at Eric, who shakes his head, and then he makes another note in the chart before snapping it shut.  


“Good,” Graber says. “You think you can walk?”  


Vince swallows: no. “Where to?”  


“Your car,” Graber says. “If you’ve got some people to stay with you, which I assume you do, you’re free to get out of here.”  


Now Eric swallows. As much as he hates the hospital, he’s comforted by the professionalism of the place. He wants to have nurses nearby and Graber just down the hall. He’s not at all sure that he’s the cure to what’s ailing Vince tonight. This isn’t something that can be smoothed over with encouraging words or truth-telling, or even — particularly — with sex.  


“OK,” Vince says. “Now?”  


“If you were going to have a really adverse reaction, we would’ve seen some sign by now.” Graber looks up. “You’re really doing pretty well, Vince. This is encouraging.”  


Vince’s smile is too pathetic to look at. “So this is as bad as it will get?” Eric asks hopefully.  


Graber frowns, that same serious, concerned frown as before. “Probably not,” he says, quietly. “Evenings are often worse. I’m going to write you a prescription for some other anti-nausea medication, and you should take it with a little food when you can. If things get bad, if you throw up more than four times in one day, you call me. You have all of my contact information if anything changes, though?”  


“Sure,” Eric says, thinking, more than four times? Vince looks startled and tired, and Eric takes the prescription and wonders where they can call it in, who will deliver.  


“All right, guys, you’re free to go.”  


And that’s it. Fifteen minutes later, after Eric’s called Turtle, Vince gets out of the chair. They offer a wheelchair but don’t insist upon it since he hasn’t formally been admitted. Eric wants to shove Vince into it, but he can see his pride is demanding he walk. So instead he stays close to him, and doesn’t say anything when Vince puts a hand on his shoulder, or when the hand grows increasingly heavy as they go.  


By the time they hit the doors, Eric has a hand on Vince’s back, too, and can feel him shaking. He opens the back door, and Vince crawls in and stretches out immediately. Eric gets in and Turtle gives him a scared, curious look.  


“Drive, Turtle, it’s OK,” he says, and the car suddenly jolts to life, swinging wildly around the bends of the hospital complex. Eric looks back and sees Vince looking even paler. “Easy,” he mutters to Turtle, “you’ll make us all carsick. Vince?”  


“OK,” he says, but he doesn’t open his eyes. A moment later, he asks, “Can we turn on the heat?” He’s shivering even with Eric’s jacket around him.  


“You bet,” Eric says, twisting the dial, aiming all of the heat toward the back.  


They make it home without incident, and Vince walks into the house without any assistance. He sinks into the first armchair in the living room. “You OK? Wanna lay down?” Eric asks.  


“No,” Vince says. He rubs his forehead. “It’s weird, I just feel out of it. Not sick, just — foggy.” He looks up at Eric; his eyes look a little red.  


“I’ll get a blanket or two, all right?” Eric says, and Vince nods. As he’s on his way back to the guest room, Turtle stops him.  


“What should I be doing?” he asks.  


“Make him some tea,” Eric says, and Turtle nods and disappears into the kitchen. At least he’s on board, Eric thinks, stripping the blankets off the bed. He carries them out and drapes them over Vince, who thanks him with a fragile smile. By the time Turtle makes it out with the tea, Vince is asleep.  


He naps for a few hours — Eric watches him sleep from the couch — and stirs when Drama comes through the front door, making, in Eric’s opinion, way too much fucking noise.  


“Hey,” Eric says, watching Vince sit up and stretch. “How you feeling?”  


“Better,” Vince says.  


“Cold?”  


“Not so bad.” He slides the blankets off and stands up. “Maybe I’m OK.”  


“Yeah?”  


Vince shrugs. “Not everyone gets all the side-effects, right? Maybe I’m lucky, like you said.”  


Eric laughs. “Christ, I hope so,” he murmurs quietly as Vince walks out of the room, heading for the bathroom. He folds the blankets, takes them back to the guest room, and then joins the guys in the kitchen.  


Vince walks in after a few minutes and drapes a casual arm around Eric’s shoulders. “What should we do?” he asks.  


Eric can see surprise on both of the other guys’ faces and is glad he’s not the only one surprised. “Uh, we figured you might want to lay low,” Turtle says.  


“I feel OK,” Vince says. “Let’s at least get something to eat, maybe get some movies or something, OK?”  


“Sure,” Drama says. “Hey, there’s that Chinese place that just opened, you wanna try that?”  


So they pile into the car — the same car that Vince shivered in earlier that day — and roll down to the new Chinese bistro on the corner. Vince, Eric notes, orders not just the sweet and sour chicken but a bowl of congee, and when the food comes, it’s this that gets his attention. In fact, by the time the food comes, Vince isn’t really talking at all, just sort of nodding along and smiling when he should laugh. Eric tries to catch his eye, to see if he’s still feeling OK, but Vince just pays attention to his food — or at least to his spoon, which he twirls above the bowl without eating hardly any.  


As they leave the restaurant, Vince puts his hand on Eric’s biceps. “Vin?”  


“We have movies at home, right?” he says quietly, and Eric nods.  


“So, Blockbuster?” Turtle asks, sliding into the driver’s seat.  


“Home,” Eric says, in his best, businesslike tone. Next to him, Vince shifts in his seat and rests his head against the back. “Put some speed on.”  


Turtle nods, and Drama, for once, gives decent directions. Vince stays quiet, nodding once when Eric asks if he’s doing OK even though Eric can see he’s swallowing hard with every turn. When they stop in the driveway, Vince’s eyes stay closed; his breathing is fast.  


“Hey, we’re home,” Eric says, touching Vince’s bent elbow. “You wanna get out?”  


“I need a minute,” Vince whispers, and Eric nods. He turns to the guys, and Drama looks at Turtle and then they both get out. Eric opens his door to let a little breeze in, hoping that will help Vince feel better.  


“How you doing?” Eric asks after a few minutes have passed. Vince isn’t breathing quite so fast anymore, and he’s not as pale.  


“Help me out, all right?” Vince says.  


Eric gets out and goes to Vince’s side, and Vince leans on him pretty heavily to get out of the car. “Bed,” he murmurs, and so that’s where Eric takes him, stripping off Vince’s shoes after he lays down. Turtle and Drama reappear, Turtle carrying a mug of tea, Drama carrying a pitcher of water and a glass, and though it’s weird it’s kind of great, too, and Eric thanks them. They’re all sort of standing there, not really sure what to do, when Vince sits bolt upright.  


“Vin?”  


“Gonna —” he manages, and then he pushes through all of them and staggers into the bathroom. Eric follows him in, and Vince slides to his knees and throws up in the toilet while Eric holds him by the shoulders.  


“You OK?” Eric asks, when Vince topples backwards against his legs.  


“Fuck,” Vince whispers.  


“Let’s get you back in bed,” Eric suggests, but Vince makes a low, negative noise. Drama’s standing at the door, looking more afraid than disgusted. Eric crouches next to Vince. His face is damp with sweat and terribly pale. “Come on, you’ll be more comfortable.”  


Vince swallows hard and puts his hand over his mouth before he nods. It takes both Eric and Drama to get him on his feet and back into bed, but eventually they settle him in with a trash can next to him. He takes a small sip of the water and spits it into the can, and Eric wipes his face with a washcloth.  


Vince groans, and his hand slides out from under the blanket. “Guess I’m not so lucky, huh?”  


Eric grips it. “Sleep,” he says. “Just try and sleep, all right? I’ll stick close, in case you need anything.”  


Vince rests fitfully, spending most of the evening shivering and trying not to throw up. The nausea medication doesn’t seem to make much of a dent, except that Vince gets groggier. He throws up again around midnight, and after that feels only briefly better. The slightest movement makes him groan; Eric’s stomach is in sympathetic knots. They’re up almost all night, Vince trying not to throw up, Eric trying to distract him and keep him comfortable. Nothing really works. He feels totally unequipped for this, watching Vince shiver and hearing him groan. His mind goes a hundred miles an hour, racing in circles: maybe there’s some kind of special tea they should be giving him? Maybe some kind of special food? Maybe they should have a masseuse in, maybe there are pressure points they should be working or something? But what it comes down to is what Eric’s suspected since the hospital: there’s just not that much he can do.  



	6. Chapter 6

The next day is basically the same. Eric sleeps when Vince does, in twenty- and thirty-minute spans, and when he’s awake he makes Vince drink water against his will and cleans his face when he throws up. Graber, via telephone, confirms that this is normal, and Eric wishes he had the energy left to beat him up.  


When Eric’s phone rings in the late afternoon, he makes Turtle go in to watch Vince while he takes it in the hallway. “Hey,” he says, recognizing Claire’s voice. “Sorry, I didn’t recognize the number, I guess, I’m kind of out of it.”  


“How’s he doing?”  


“Sick as a dog.”  


“Poor thing,” Claire says. “How are you?”  


Eric glances down at himself. His shirt is wrinkled and wet at the bottom, from the glass of water Vince spilled a few minutes ago in his hurry to get to the trash can. He probably smells of vomit and sweat. “It sucks,” he says, having no better answer. “Nothing I do is helping.”  


“What have you tried?”  


He tells her they’re keeping Vince in bed and making him drink something every hour. He mentions the herbal tea that Drama has made and the way they’ve been chipping ice for Vince to suck on using a plastic bag and a wrench. He doesn’t, for some reason, mention that he spent the better part of the night holding Vince’s head in his lap and stroking his sweaty hair.  


Claire says, “I know a few things that might help. Can I — would it be all right if I dropped by after work?”  


“Yes,” Eric says. “Anything.”  


It’s only after he hangs up that he realizes he’s in no state to receive company, and neither is Vince. Particularly not third-date company; a long-term girlfriend, maybe, but Claire is new. She’s never even seen the house before, and now — Eric groans. He walks back to Vince’s bedroom, sees that he’s now curled up, a pillow pulled to his chest, his eyes clenched shut. There can’t be anything more for him to throw up, Eric thinks, and glances at Turtle. He tilts his head toward the hallway, then says, “Vin, you need anything, yell. We’ll just be a second.”  


Vince doesn’t move.  


In the hall, Turtle pounds one clenched fist into his palm, an expression of frustration Eric totally understands. “Should I smoke him up?” Turtle asks. “You know, they say it’s good for, like, medicinal purposes.”  


Eric rubs his face. He’s willing to try anything, honestly. “Maybe,” he says. “I don’t know. Listen, Claire’s coming over.”  


“You invited your girlfriend?”  


“She’s a nurse. And she says she knows some stuff that might help.” Turtle’s still frowning, but at least he nods. “You think you can keep an eye on him? I’m gonna clean up a bit.”  


Turtle shrugs. He seems to have developed some vomit tolerance already. “He’s not going anywhere.”  


Eric doesn’t feel better after the shower; he feels strangely more exhausted, like he’s waking up after a too-short night with too much to do. He doesn’t bother drying his hair, just runs his hand through it and heads downstairs. Before he goes to check on Vince, he stops and opens the doors to the deck to let in a little fresh air. He wishes they had some candles or something to burn — but then again, that might be hard on Vince’s sensitive stomach.  


Vince seems to be dozing, so Eric tiptoes back out and waits for Claire in the driveway. When she arrives — in a well-kept old Celica — he opens her door, and kisses her cheek in greeting. She smells strangely like the hospital, like the soap they use, and he realizes she must have called just as she was getting off work.  


“I brought some real ginger ale, a back massager, and some pretty mellow pot,” she says, giving him a frank, wonderful smile. “And I know where we can get some kick-ass chicken soup if he wants it later.”  


Eric feels actual relief. “Thank God for you,” he says, and helps her carry in a paper bag full of stuff.  


The ginger ale has a really sharp flavor that Eric hates but Vince tolerates pretty well. He sits against the headboard to drink a small glass, and Claire also gives him a piece of dry toast. “Small meals can really help,” she says.  


“I’ll drink to anything that helps,” Vince says. His voice is raspy, but his color is improved, at least. Eric can’t tell how much of this is actual improvement and how much is just Vince trying to put on a good face for company. It makes him uncomfortable that he doesn’t care which it is, so long as Vince seems better.  


Once he’s had the drink, Claire has him turn on his stomach on the bed and shows Eric how to use the massager, which is just a little hand-held, three-legged wooden contraption that looks a bit like a molecule model. He’s pretty sure his mom used to have one. Vince groans, but it’s a good groan, and when Eric watches his eyes growing heavy he wants to kiss Claire right then and there. He falls asleep, and Eric puts his finger to his lips and leads Claire into the hall.  


“Thank you,” he says sincerely. “He’s barely rested at all today, I mean, it’s been — and I haven’t been able to —”  


“It’s my job, Eric,” she says gently, touching his arm. “Come on, let’s sit a while. You look like you could use a massage, too.”  


He rolls his neck around. Yeah, he’s stiff, and tense, but even a miracle massager isn’t going to make that go away until Vince is feeling tip-top again. “I could use some time with you,” he says, trying to smile like he’s interested, and appreciating the comforting hand she rubs across his shoulders.  


Drama pokes his head out of the kitchen. He’s got the day off work but has to film that evening. “He OK?”  


“He’s asleep,” Eric says.  


Claire sniffs. “What are you cooking?”  


“Just a little ragout and some pasta,” he says. “Carbo loading wouldn’t hurt any of us.” He grins at Claire. “It’s almost done, you guys want to try it?”  


“We’d love to,” Claire says.  


Eric’s too tired to eat, but Claire is already pushing him into the living room. “I’m really not that hungry,” he says, but she shakes her head.  


“You need to keep your strength up,” she says.  


“I’m not the one —”  


“Caretaking is pretty demanding.”  


“No kidding,” Turtle says from the big chair. “Say, can I ask you something?”  


Claire agrees that the pot is probably a good idea, though she says it will be more helpful the next day and down the road. “Appetite is important,” she says, and then she draws out her own small baggy. “This is pretty light, not too likely to mess him up much. You know, you can probably get this for him legally. McNaight will totally sign the form.”  


“I know a guy, too,” Drama says, and Eric laughs, for the first time in 24 hours.  


They all have a bowl of Drama’s pasta, which turns out to be quite good. Eric’s hungrier than he would have guessed, and only remembers that he hasn’t had anything to eat since the night before when he reaches the bottom of the bowl. After dinner, the other guys smoke up, but Eric and Claire decline — she’s subject to drug tests, and Eric just can’t relax while Vince might need him. He sees Claire off at about 8, kissing her at the front door.  


“This sounds stupid,” she says, “but just keep his spirits up. It helps. Distract him, entertain him. It’s better than any of the drugs.”  


Eric nods. “I’ve been doing that my whole life, I guess.”  


As she drives away, his mind is already back on Vince. He goes right to check on him and finds him awake, lying very still on his back. The rest of the evening vanishes; he feels guilty for eating, for being able to eat, for laughing, for not being right here for the last few hours. Eric sits next to him. “Yo,” he says, quietly.  


“Hmm.”  


His skin is still a little pale, but he’s not green, at least. “How do you feel?”  


“Fine,” Vince says, his lips barely moving.  


“Uh-huh. Really.”  


“If I don’t move, I’m fine. Better than before.” Eric nods, and Vince closes his eyes. “Claire go home?”  


“Yeah.”  


“She’s nice.”  


“We’re gonna get stocked up on that ginger ale.” Vince hmms. He’s so still even his breathing seems slight. “Anything I can do?”  


“No.”  


Eric puts his fingertips on Vince’s temple, then moves them to his forehead, feeling for fever, though he’s not sure how he’d know. Something about touching him makes Eric feel a little better, so he brushes some of Vince’s hair back and tries not to think about Vince losing it. Distract him, he thinks. “How about, we could get a movie,” Eric says. “Pay-per-view? There’s gotta be something on.”  


“Whatever,” Vince says. He turns, suddenly, and curls on his side, facing Eric.  


“You OK? Vince?”  


“Put in the movie,” he whispers after a minute, and so Eric tracks down the remote and orders the first thing that looks remotely interesting, the last movie Jessica Biel made about girl detectives in New York. Vince stays curled up, but when Eric comments on the preposterousness of the movie’s premise — how these girls are affording their own condos on the Upper East Side is beyond him — he makes a little, wheezy laughing noise. Eric strokes his hair and keeps up his commentary. Vince rests his head on Eric’s thigh.  


When Turtle and Drama peek in after a while, Eric waves them in. Turtle settles on the small couch, and Drama takes a seat on the floor, at the foot of the bed. Between them, it’s not hard to keep the humor rolling, and when Eric looks down and sees Vince is asleep again he feels a quick flush of emotion, like he wants to cry. He looks over at Turtle, who stops talking mid-sentence.  


“Should we go?” he asks, very quietly.  


“No, hang out,” Eric says. His voice is thick, and he looks down at Vince to avoid the guys seeing his face. “OK?”  


“Sure thing,” Drama says.  


  


Vince wakes up feeling better the next day. Eric can tell because he wakes up next to him, and Vince smiles a little when Eric looks at him. “You OK?” Eric asks.  


“Yeah,” Vince says. He rubs his stomach. “Believe it or not, I’m a little hungry.”  


“I believe it.” Eric sits up, rubs his hands over his face. It’s almost ten; they’ve slept for nearly twelve hours. “I can see about some breakfast.”  


“I’ll meet you out there. I’m gonna hit the john,” Vince says, and he sits up and swings his legs over the edge of the bed like it’s any other day. He stands up at the same time Eric does, and maybe that’s how he misses it — all he hears is Vince saying, “Or not,” and then he’s back on the bed, head in his hands.  


“Vin?”  


“Whoa,” Vince says, his voice muffled.  


Eric rushes to the other side, puts one hand on Vince’s shoulder. “You all right? You need the trash can?”  


“Head rush,” Vince mutters. “Just — wow, I think I almost passed out.”  


Eric squeezes his shoulder. “OK, you wanna lay back?” Vince murmurs what sounds like a yes, so Eric helps him ease back to the bed. He lays there with his arm over his eyes for a minute while Eric stands beside the bed, not sure exactly what to do. He finally settles for pulling the blankets up around him.  


Vince opens one eye. “Ugh,” he says.  


“You feel sick?”  


“Just — dizzy, kind of,” Vince says. He swallows. “Fuck.”  


“Just lay still, I bet it will pass.”  


“Yeah, but I’ve still got to piss,” Vince says, smirking just a little, and Eric pats his leg.  


“Don’t think about it.”  


“Easy for you to say.”  


“Well, you want me to help you over there?”  


Vince opens both eyes. “I think I can do it on my own, but thanks.”  


Eric shrugs, knows he’s blushing. “Just don’t make me clean your ass up off the floor, all right? We already have to tip the maid double to clean Turtle’s bathroom.”  


Vince eventually does get up on his own and makes it to the bathroom just fine. He joins them for breakfast in the kitchen, and though he looks tired, he doesn’t look too sick. Drama makes toast and oatmeal and flat, dry pancakes, all of which Vince picks at unenthusiastically. Eventually, he settles in on the couch, and Drama produces a box-set of some television series he’s been after them all to watch for the last two years. “We’re finally going to do it,” he says, and so they watch four hours of “Rome,” and Vince naps.  


That’s the way things go: Vince naps; he gets up; he eats a little; he naps again. In between naps, the guys try to distract and entertain him with movies and video games and cards and random gossip, and Eric thinks they’re mostly successful. Vince at least sleeps comfortably through the night, and though he sometimes doesn’t want to, he’s eating and drinking again at regular intervals, and keeping everything down.  


The fourth day after his treatment, Ari calls to say he’s on his way, and Eric’s glad. He’ll be a nice distraction, and Vince is feeling pretty good. They’re talking about going out the next day, maybe just to lunch or something; Vince is tired, but Eric can tell he’s getting a little stir-crazy, too. He tells Vince Ari is on the way, and Vince gets up to take a shower. Eric wants to tell him to leave the door open, just in case, but Vince has been perfectly steady since the other day, so he says nothing. Instead he hangs out in the kitchen until the alarm beeps to say Ari’s coming through the gate.  


Ari walks in carrying a huge basket of tea and different kinds of crackers. Eric gapes, then leads him into the kitchen. “It’s the morning-sickness bunch from Hollywood Florists. Tons of herbal ginger tea and some other Asian stuff in there that Lloyd suggested. Usually we send it to whoever’s gotten knocked up, but I thought maybe it’d be useful here, too. We had them knock off the baby booties.”  


“Uh, thanks,” Eric says, looking at the basket. It’s strangely touching. He turns back to Ari and flinches, because in the last thirty seconds, Ari has pulled on a surgical mask. “What the fuck, Ari?”  


“I have kids, Eric,” he says, tying the mask behind his head.  


“Christ, he’s got cancer, not the plague. It’s not contagious.”  


Ari rolls his eyes above the mask. “I know that, dumb fuck,” he says. “What I’m saying is, I have kids, and they go to school, where they pick up whatever the new bird flu is, and they bring it home to me. I did my homework. Our boy’s on carboplatin, it fucks up his immune system. Right?”  


Eric blinks. He’s really got no idea; the furthest he got in the information that Graber sent home with them was the line about nausea and vomiting and increased fatigue. He did, however, fax the information to Ari, because he asked for it. “Uh, I guess,” he says, scratching his neck. He hears the shower turn off down the hall.  


Ari shakes his head. “You know, I always knew you were a little slow, E, but I didn’t think you were actually illiterate. Your best friend is going through fucking chemotherapy and you didn’t look up the drug effects? Jesus.”  


“I’ve been a little busy, Ari,” Eric snaps, but it’s really just a knee-jerk reaction. He’s already starting to feel nervous and guilty.  


“One cold and he’s in the hospital,” Ari mutters.  


“That’s — the immune system thing, it’s just a possible side effect,” Eric says. He hopes that’s true. He remembers the line at the top of the form, saying that not everyone had every side effect, because he remembers hoping Vince wouldn’t have any of them. Ari looks ready to throttle him, so Eric says, quickly, “We’re going to see the doctor tomorrow to get his blood counts checked, all right? I’m doing the best that I can.”  


“Do better,” Ari snaps. “It’s not a game.”  


“No fucking kidding.” Eric has more to say — a whole fucking lot more, because if anyone gets the gravity of the situation, surely, it’s him, unless Ari’s recently had to wash vomit out of his jeans or force his best friend to eat a little more oatmeal and drink a little more juice even though he’s said he’s not up to it — but he hears the bedroom door open at the end of the hall and snaps his mouth shut. Vince walks into the kitchen a few moments later, wearing sweatpants and an overlarge sweatshirt with the sleeves pushed up. His hair — still all there, as far as Eric can tell — is wet, and he smells like his expensive citrusy soap.  


“Uh, what’s with the mask?” he asks, stopping at the island next to Eric.  


“There’s a thing going around at work,” Ari says. “I didn’t want you to catch it. How are you, my man?”  


Vince shrugs. “Good,” he says. His forearms cord when he leans against the counter. “Just hanging out, catching up on my sleep and my HBO.”  


“That’s not so bad, huh?”  


“I’d rather be working,” Vince says, and Eric knows that’s true. Man, he’d rather be on set, too. He’d rather be on set with _Billy_ , in fact, but he’s sure not going to say that.  


“And trust me, they’d love to have you. I hear Ryan’s a real prima donna, no one’s happy about the switch. But it’s their loss and our gain, baby, don’t you worry. E and I were just talking about some of the new possibilities you’re gonna have.”  


Vince glances at him, and Eric hopes his nod is convincing. He’s not sure what Ari’s up to, but right now, he’s willing to play along. “Yeah?” Vince says. “Anything good?”  


“Everything good,” Ari says. “Look, we’re not going to rush into anything, though, all right? Just don’t — don’t even think about work stuff, we’ve got it covered. That’s what you pay us for, right?”  


“And apparently for the cool gift baskets,” Vince says. “This is nice, Ari. Tell Lloyd thanks, too.”  


“You can tell him yourself, as soon as you’re back in the game. He’d rather hear it from your pretty face than mine, trust me.”  


Vince puts his hand on Eric’s shoulder. “Maybe we could run over there later this week, you think? A little field trip?”  


Ari’s glaring daggers at Eric when he glances over, and Eric turns quickly back to Vince. “Maybe,” he says. “We’ll, uh, keep us posted on the bug that’s going around, Ari, right?”  


“Of course,” Ari says. “You know, Vinnie, you really want a field trip, we can set something up. You guys could get out of town for a while, relax…”  


“Get a few pictures taken so the world doesn’t think I’m on my death bed?” Vince asks, and Eric flinches, expecting Ari to agree.  


Instead, Ari shakes his head so hard the mask briefly slips. “No pictures. Huh-uh. You’re too healthy-looking for us to do that.”  


“I’m — what?”  


“You get your photo out there right now, looking like Mr. Fucking Universe, as always, there’s gonna be rumors that this was all some weird plot to get you out of _Keyword_. No, better to stay home, all right? Or go somewhere nice and isolated. There’s this resort, you literally rent the whole island while you’re there. I heard Tom Hanks got it for a week for his wedding anniversary last year.”  


Eric can picture that vacation, and something about it is very appealing. Vince needs rest and relaxation right now more than anything. If they stay in L.A., that’s going to be harder and harder to arrange, because he’s going to get cabin fever pretty fast. Maybe if they took a vacation, though, he’d use the time as he should: lying in a beach chair, lathered up with sun-screen, sleeping off the poisons in his body. “We’ll think it over,” Eric says.  


Ari sticks around for a little while longer, chatting and gossiping with Vince and throwing sneering lines at Eric, but Eric doesn’t try to pay attention. He’s running on a newly developed filter system where all he takes in are the subtle signs of whether Vince is OK or not, whether he’s getting too tired, whether he needs more water, whether it’s time to take a pill. And while that’s all running in his head, he’s thinking of the things he needs to do when Vince naps next: make sure they’ve got something decent to eat that evening, return a call to Claire, look into this immune system stuff that Ari’s talking about, get Turtle to make sure they get a new water delivery tomorrow.  


“I’m just saying, man, you need anything, you let me know. I’ve still got the number for Naughty Nurse Home Health Care from when I broke my leg at Telluride, OK?”  


“All right, Ari,” Vince says, and he holds his hand out for a quick shake. Eric notices Ari’s brief hesitation before they clasp hands; he hopes Vince doesn’t. “Thanks for coming by.”  


“Anytime,” Ari says. “I’ll check in again, don’t you worry. And E, let’s stay in touch about those projects, OK?”  


“Sure,” Eric says, seeing Ari to the door.  


Vince lags behind in the kitchen, so Ari’s final whispered, “You keep him away from people, you understand me?” doesn’t carry.  


“I’ll look into it,” Eric says, and closes the door firmly behind him.  


Vince is yawning when Eric walks in to the kitchen. “What’s his deal?” he asks.  


“What?”  


“He was kind of weird, with the mask and all.” Vince blinks. He’s leaning sideways against the counter.  


“Ari’s always weird,” Eric says. He puts his hand on Vince’s side, just gives him an affectionate pat. “I can’t believe it took you this long to realize that.”  


“Hmm.” Vince grins. “You think I look like Mr. Universe?”  


Eric smirks and pats Vince again, then walks to the fridge. “Sure,” he says. “Not sure which universe.”  


He opens the door, thinking to get them each a new bottle of water, and is surprised to feel Vince’s hands on his waist. “C’mon,” Vince says, “pump up my ego a little, huh?”  


He laughs, feeling a little awkward. “You’re out of this world, how about that?”  


“Corny,” Vince murmurs. His mouth is against Eric’s temple. “But that’s OK. I like it.”  


“Uh — Vin?” Eric asks, one of his hands resting on Vince’s.  


In response he feels Vince kiss his neck, and Vince’s hands rub over his belly. Eric thinks two things as this happens: He thinks of Ari’s warning, and he thinks of Vince saying “This isn’t that kind of story.”  


“What’re you doing?” he manages when Vince starts to turn him around. Eric turns, but leans back against the refrigerator, trying to stay out of easy kissing range.  


“I’m bored,” Vince says. He pulls Eric’s shirt out of his pants.  


“What about Claire?”  


Vince laughs, just a little, and Eric can feel it against his neck. “I won’t tell.”  


“Vince,” Eric says, getting the full word in now, stiffening his shoulders. “Yo, come on. Not a good idea.”  


Vince looks up like he thinks Eric’s joking, and Eric feels bad the instant that Vince gets it, because he looks, actually, disappointed. He looks _hurt_. “Whatever,” he says, and draws away. He walks to the other side of the island and sits on a stool.  


“Vince,” Eric murmurs, putting his hands flat on the counter, but Vince isn’t looking at him; he’s looking at the basket Ari dropped off as though it’s the most interesting thing in the world.  


“Let’s go somewhere today, all right?” Vince says, turning the basket.  


Eric swallows. _We shouldn’t_ is on the tip of his tongue, but there are only so many times he can say that to Vince in one day. So he says, instead, “Like where?”  


Vince shrugs. “I don’t care. Let’s buy some new games for the Wii, maybe.”  


“I’ll ask Turtle where’s good,” Eric says, and Vince nods.  


He’s halfway to the living room when he realizes the choice he’s just made: he pushed Vince away because of what Ari said, about the possible risk to his health, and now he’s going to let him go out in public as an apology? He turns around and walks right back into the kitchen, where Vince is sitting with his head in his hands.  


“What’d he say?” Vince asks, pulling his head up, and Eric shakes his head. He doesn’t know how he missed the signal here, but Vince is beat. No way they’re going anywhere.  


He puts his hands on Vince’s shoulders and rubs, gently. “Come on,” he says, hooking his arm around Vince’s back. “Bed.”  


Back in Vince’s room, with Vince sitting against the headboard and Eric facing him, he tells Vince about Ari’s worry, about his own. “Oh,” Vince says, and blinks. He seems to be studying the bedspread. “So — what does that mean, exactly? You’re gonna start wearing a mask now, too?”  


“No,” Eric says, though — well, it doesn’t seem like a bad idea. “I just think, maybe, until we talk to the doc tomorrow, we ought to, like, try and keep you away from stuff.”  


“Germs,” Vince says, and Eric nods. “And people.” Eric shrugs. Vince rubs both hands over his face and groans. “This just gets better and better.”  


“Vince —”  


He sighs. “I suppose this means no blowjob, huh?”  


“Uh,” Eric says, and then laughs. “Actually, that could probably be arranged.”  


Vince smiles, but it’s a small, unamused smile. “Somehow, I’m not in the mood anymore.”  


Eric puts his hand on Vince’s knee, gives him a little tap. “I know I’m Captain Buzzkill recently, man. I’m sorry.”  


“It’s not really you,” Vince says. He slides down into bed, so that Eric’s hand slips away. “I really blame the cancer.”  


“I blame your overused balls,” Eric says, and Vince smirks. His sweatshirt has ridden up, and Eric sees the fading purple bruise around Vince’s incision. He shakes his head and tugs the sweatshirt down, pulls the comforter up over Vince. “Seriously, how could you be in the mood? You gotta still be sore down there.”  


Vince’s smile turns strangely tender. “You’re a pretty gentle guy, E,” he says, and Eric feels himself blush.  


He clears his throat and looks to the side. “You know, what Ari was talking about, that trip? Maybe once this is all over, if you wanted to —”  


“And if the doctor clears it,” Vince says. “Yeah, maybe.” His head is settled onto his pillow.  


“You gonna nap?”  


“Guess so,” he says, his eyes already closed. “Don’t eat my snack basket, all right? I might want some of that later.”  


“I’ll move it in here for safekeeping,” Eric promises, but he doesn’t move until Vince is asleep.  



	7. Chapter 7

The next day, they get up late and Eric calls Drama to see if he’ll bring something in for breakfast. “On my way,” he promises, so thirty minutes later they’re all sitting in the kitchen, showered and ready for food.  


“Blast from the past,” Drama says, dropping a paper bag on the table. “Egg sandwiches.”  


“All right, Drama,” Turtle says, and he and Eric stand at the same time to pull the bag open. Vince stands, too, and Eric turns to hand him the first sandwich from the bag, then realizes he’s not there. “Uh —” he starts, and turns to see Vince disappearing into the hallway. “Vince?”  


He finds him sitting on the edge of the bathtub in the guest bedroom, rubbing the back of his neck. “The smell,” he murmurs, and rests his head against the wall. His skin is pale and his arms have goosebumps. Eric closes the door.  


“Hey,” he says. “Wow. Jesus, I’m sorry.” Vince shrugs. “You gonna throw up?”  


“I don’t think so,” he says. “But for a minute there —”  


Eric pulls a washcloth out of the drawer and wets it with cold water, then gives it to Vince. He presses it to his forehead, then his throat. “God, it’s the worst feeling,” he says. He looks dangerously close to crying, and Eric shudders.  


He sits next to him, lets his shoulder brush Vince’s. “We’ll tell Graber today. I bet he can help.”  


“Yeah.”  


“You want some water or something?”  


Vince shrugs. “Just give me a minute, all right?”  


“Sure,” Eric says, squeezing Vince’s shoulder. He can tell he’s being dismissed. “Take all the time you need.”  


He goes back to the kitchen, where Turtle and Drama have, for once, got everything under control. The bag is gone, the windows are open, and Turtle’s busy pouring a big glass of iced water while Drama’s hovering by the toaster oven. “He OK?” Turtle asks.  


“Fine, yeah,” Eric says. “Thanks, guys.”  


“I didn’t think about it,” Drama says, his voice breaking. “I didn’t even — I mean, I knew he liked them, so I —”  


“It’s OK.” Eric picks up his own glass of juice. “Drama, seriously, man, he’s OK. He’s not mad.”  


“I’m mad,” Drama says, plucking two pieces of toast out. “What a fucking jerk I am.”  


“You’re not, Johnny,” Vince says. His voice is sturdy, his smile easy. Standing in the doorway, he looks fucking terrible, though. He looks skinny and pale and sick, and Eric clears his throat and fumbles with his cell phone. They have a little under an hour to get to Cedars. “Hey, for me?” Vince asks.  


“Yeah.” Drama puts the toast on a plate, and Turtle carries it and the water to the table. “I’m so sorry, bro.”  


Vince shrugs and takes his seat. He sips the water. “It was a really nice gesture,” he says. “And it’s the thought that counts, OK?”  


“OK.” Drama still looks kind of unsteady, and Eric suddenly wants to beat the crap out of him. Vince needs them to be strong, he doesn’t need this weird fucking mother hen guilt trip bullshit. Vince is trying so hard, so fucking hard, to act like everything’s normal, and Drama’s getting sniffly over a piece of toast? Wrong, Eric thinks. He catches Turtle’s eye and tilts his head toward the door.  


Turtle nods and says, “Hey, Drama, let’s make sure the car’s warm, all right?”  


“Yeah, sure,” Drama says, and Eric doesn’t look at him as he and Turtle walk out.  


When they’re gone, Vince gives Eric a tired, flat look. “You ordering them around?”  


“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” he says.  


“E —”  


“Do you want to take that with you? We’ve got some bottles,” Eric says, standing up. “We probably ought to get going, though, in case there’s traffic.”  


Vince shrugs and Eric gets a bottle of water from the fridge. He waits for Vince to stand on his own but stays close enough that Vince can and does put a hand on his shoulder as they walk outside.  


In the car, Vince puts on his sunglasses and says to Turtle and Drama, “Guys, you gotta babysit me tonight, OK?”  


“Uh, what?” Turtle says. “You planning to get fucked up or something?”  


“No,” Vince says, “but E needs to get laid.”  


“Shit, when’s it my turn?” Turtle asks even as Eric’s sputtering, “Vince —”  


Vince glares over at him. “You’re a ball of nerves. Call Claire, take her to dinner, do whatever magic you have to, but fucking get some, E, OK?” He shakes his head. “I’d do it myself, as a public service, but…”  


Eric laughs in spite of himself. OK, he thinks, if this is how Vince wants to play it, that’s how they’ll play it.  


At Graber’s clinic, Vince is taken back to the lab to have some blood drawn while the guys are left to cool their heels in the waiting room. They wait for a while, and then Eric paces to the door and calls Claire, gets her machine. “Hey,” he says, aware that Drama and Turtle are listening in, “I just thought I’d see, uh, if you were free tonight. For dinner, maybe, and to hang out. And, you know, I wanted to thank you again, for your help the other day with Vince, and — and I want to see you. So just give me a call when you get this. Oh, this is Eric, uh, OK,” he says, and hangs up.  


“Good luck with that,” Turtle says, shaking his head.  


“Shut up.” A nurse walks out and glances at them, and Eric stands.  


“You’re Eric?” she asks, and he nods. “Come this way.”  


He feels a little bad, leaving Drama and Turtle behind, because this isn’t Ari’s office or a business deal, but — well, he wouldn’t want those guys hanging around hearing about his medical tests, either. Drama isn’t exactly soothing, and Turtle’s usual best ideas for treatment — getting stoned or getting laid — aren’t really great advice for this.  


The nurse leads Eric past the exam rooms and to Graber’s actual office, where Vince is back in the expensive leather chair, facing Graber’s broad desk. He turns and grins past Eric at the nurse, and Eric shakes his head as she blushes before closing the door.  


“He’ll be out in a bit. They’re rushing the results for us,” Vince says, and Eric nods and takes the seat next to him.  


“What’d they do?”  


Vince stretches out his left arm and lifts the sleeve to show Eric a cotton ball taped near the bend of his elbow. “Had a chest X-ray, then they took some blood,” he says. When he rolls the sleeve back down, Eric notices his hands are shaking.  


“A lot of blood?” he asks. Vince shrugs, which probably means yes. “You OK?”  


He shrugs again and tucks his hands up under his arms. “I’m missing my mid-morning nap,” he says.  


“I’m sure it’s missing you, too.”  


Graber shuffles in after a few moments, wearing a lab coat and looking not quite so cool as he did in the hospital. He’s trailed by a younger man in a lab coat who’s carrying a stack of charts. Graber shoos the guy out and then sits on the corner of his desk. “How are you feeling?” he asks.  


“OK,” Vince says, and Eric glares at him. “Tired, mostly,” he finally says.  


“You been taking it easy this week?”  


He nods. Eric says, “He sleeps about 12 hours a day.”  


“That’s all right, that’s normal. How about your stomach?”  


So Vince tells him about that — “off and on, I get a little queasy” — and about the lightheadedness, which he says has been kind of constant over the last day or so. That surprises Eric; he really thought Vince was doing pretty good.  


“Well, from what I’m seeing on your tests, Vince, that’s not a surprise either. Red and white counts aren’t where they should be.” He runs through some numbers that Eric jots into his PDA as they go. They don’t mean anything to him, but this does: “We’re gonna try starting you on something to get your white counts up, so you’ll be less prone to infection. How are you with needles?”  


Vince shrugs even as Eric swallows. “The least of my worries, right now,” he says, and Graber nods and turns to Eric.  


“What? I need a shot?” he asks. He’ll do it, of course, if he needs to. He’ll get a shot every hour if that’s what it takes to make sure Vince doesn’t get sick.  


“No, but you could help give one. It’s a daily injection,” Graber says. “We can show you both how to administer it at home, if you’d rather not come back here every day.”  


“Oh.” Eric nods, even as Vince says, “He hates needles.”  


“It’s fine,” Eric says. “Sure, let’s do it.”  


“And I’d like to see you again in a week, OK? We’ll do these tests all over, make sure you’re hanging in there.”  


Eric nods again, and so does Vince, and Graber starts to stand. Vince’s voice, which is strangely tentative, stops him. “Is it, uh, is it going to get worse?” he asks.  


Graber sits back down. “Well, we’re a week out. The nausea, that kind of stuff, that should be going away. But we typically see a peak in fatigue at the two week mark, around there, because of the anemia and leukopenia. These shots should help, OK?”  


“Do the shots have side effects?” Eric asks.  


“There’s sometimes some bone pain,” Graber says. “If you feel bad after this first one, make sure you take a couple Tylenol before the next dose, that should help. Not Advil, OK, make sure it’s Tylenol.”  


“Got it,” Eric says, already planning the trip to the drug store. He’s been thinking maybe they should buy some of those protein shakes or little snack bars they use to help old people keep up their energy. Graber stands again, and puts his hand on Vince’s shoulder in a mild, comforting way. Vince nods and thanks him, and Graber says he’ll send someone in to help them with the injection.  


Vince is looking to the side and breathing a little fast, and Eric wants to ask him what’s wrong, what’s he thinking, but he has the feeling that any kindness he shows is just maybe going to make things worse for Vince at the moment. So he texts Turtle to let him know they’re going to be a little bit longer, and when the door opens again he makes sure to engage the nurse’s attention himself, letting Vince sit quietly. The nurse shows them how to fill the syringe and check it for air, then has Vince roll up his sleeve so she can choose and clean a spot. She slides the needle into Vince’s upper arm. “Lucky for you, it won’t be hard to find muscle on this guy,” she says, smiling at Vince and then Eric.  


Vince is wincing and biting his lip, so Eric nods and tries to smile, like Vince usually would. “Once a day?”  


“That’s the recommendation,” she says. She draws the needle out and slides a cotton ball over the tiny pinprick of blood that rises. “All done. You think you’ve got it?”  


Eric assures her they do, and they both stand and follow her out, Vince gripping his biceps as they walk. Eric holds his other arm, not even sure if he needs it to keep steady, but wanting to be there. Vince keeps his head down. “You all right?” Eric asks in the elevator, and Vince just shrugs.  


He doesn’t talk until they’re in the car, when he says, “You guys can pick up food, it’s OK. I feel fine.”  


Eric diverts Turtle to a little taco place that’s next to Walgreens. “You want to get food, go over there, I’ve gotta get some stuff,” Eric says.  


“I’ll wait here,” Vince says, and Drama volunteers to wait, too.  


Once they’re outside, Eric turns to Turtle and says, “Whatever you buy, you put it in the fucking trunk, all right?”  


“Get some 7-Up, he likes that shit,” Turtle says, and they split up at the curb. Inside, Eric gets the prescriptions filled and buys a pack of protein shakes and a 2-Liter of 7-Up. By the time he gets back to the car, Vince is asleep with his head against the window, drooling just a little, and Drama looks pissed.  


“What?” Eric whispers. Drama mimes something like a box in front of his face, and it takes Eric a moment to get it — a camera. He scans the parking lot but doesn’t see any paparazzi, just shoppers coming and going and two little girls lurking at the entrance to the taco shop. Of course, he thinks. He knows what Vince looks like right now — wiped out and sick, skin pale, hair messy, a day’s beard rough on his chin. Fuck whatever Ari says about his pictures being too good, right now — Vince doesn’t need to see his face plastered over the Internet, looking out of it like this. He rolls his eyes, sighs, and sets the shopping bag on the floor before he gets out of the car.  


“Hey,” he says, walking up to the two girls. “Uh, did one of you take a picture of my friend?”  


They can’t be older than 13, though they’re dressed like they’re sixteen, in tight jeans and sparkling eye shadow. They’re both clutching pink cell phones. Eric sighs again. “I’m not mad. I just — he’s not feeling so great, and I thought, uh, maybe we could make a deal. You erase those photos, give me your names, I’ll make sure you each get signed photos, mailed to you. And tickets to the next premiere.”  


One of the girls blinks. “Really?”  


“I told you it’s him!” the one on the left says, her voice nearly a squeak.  


Eric nods. “I’m his manager. What’s your favorite movie?”  


“ _Aquaman_ ,” they both say.  


Turtle walks out and gives Eric a very weird look, and Eric glares over at him. “Look,” he says, “if you want, I can get you a copy of that, too, signed, maybe with a note or something.”  


The girl on the right gasps, but her friend says, “Can you get Mandy Moore to sign, too?”  


“Yes,” Eric says, “if you let me delete the picture off your phone.”  


They do. He clears out the photos — there’s only one on each camera, and they’re pretty unfocused at that — and takes their names and phone numbers. Shauna can handle coming through on this promise for him, he figures. He owes her a call, anyway.  


Back in the car, Vince is awake but looks groggy. He just sort of nods to Eric before they start the car. “Did you get any Tylenol?” he asks, then takes two dry and settles back down.  


“Headache?”  


“Just my arm,” Vince says. “Don’t worry, it’s fine.”  


He doesn’t complain about it, not even later that day when he asks for more Tylenol. Eric carries a few more caplets and a refilled glass of 7-UP out to Vince and sits next to him on the couch. He’s been pretty quiet since they saw Graber, but Eric can’t tell if it’s because he’s feeling worse or just tired or what. It worries him more when Vince is quiet, he realizes, than when he’s whining.  


The basketball game they’re watching ends, and Turtle asks what they want to see next. Vince just shrugs.  


“Seriously, you OK?” Eric asks, turning to face Vince.  


“I’m fine,” Vince says. His eyes are closed, his head tipped back against the couch. “Chill out, E, OK?”  


Before Eric can push for more, his phone rings. _Claire_. He briefly closes his eyes before answering. “Hey.”  


“Hey,” she says, sounding alarmingly chipper. “I just got your message. Dinner sounds great, but my feet are killing me. What would you think of coming over here?”  


“Your place?” Eric says, and Vince gives him a thumbs up. “Sure, uh, yeah. That sounds good. What time? Seven, sure. Yeah.” He agrees to pick up some wine and averts his eyes from the strange, knowing smirk on Vince’s face.  


“Thank fucking God,” Turtle says when Eric hangs up.  


“We’ve got a good red here somewhere,” Vince says. “Johnny, you remember, what did Patrick give me at that reading? Like a case of something good, right?”  


“Oh, man, if that wine doesn’t get you laid, bro, nothing will,” Drama says. “Take it with my blessing, too. I’m not a barolo man.”  


“Take a couple bottles,” Vince says.  


“Guys, I’m taking wine to go with dinner, not trying to get her drunk so she’ll fuck me,” Eric says.  


Turtle snorts. “But it’ll help.”  


“You’re all fucking animals,” Eric says as the other guys laugh. “Jesus. Why do I even listen to you?”  


“Because if you hadn’t, you’d be staying home with us tonight instead of seeing the lovely Claire,” Vince says.  


“Yeah, God forbid,” Eric says, and he pretends to shudder, though really what he’s thinking is that it wouldn’t be so bad. Maybe it’s the stress of the last few weeks, maybe it’s just a lack of real trust in Turtle and Drama’s bedside manner, but Eric realizes he doesn’t want to go to Claire’s place. He feels weird about it — no, worse, he feels like he’s betraying Vince, by going out and having a good time while he’s still sick and sore and tired. But he knows he can’t say any of that, so he hauls himself up and goes upstairs to change. When he comes back down, in dark slacks and a green button-down shirt, the other guys cheer and heckle him.  


“Yeah, yeah,” Eric says. “Don’t wait up, fuckers.”  


“Don’t you come home tonight,” Vince calls after him.  


Something in his tone is kind of annoying and strangely paternal. Eric gets into his car feeling a little pissed off. He’s a grown man, after all, he doesn’t need Vince setting him up or pushing him out the door. If he wanted to get a girl, he’d fucking get a girl. This shit is stupid. He starts to wonder if maybe Vince is so keen on Eric getting laid because he’s currently off the market. Maybe, for once in their lives, Vince is trying to live vicariously through Eric. That thought makes him laugh aloud, and he hits the gas pedal a little harder, determined to be on time to dinner.  


Claire has a small but tasteful apartment not too far from the hospital. She’s decorated it mostly with pictures of other cities — the Manhattan skyline calls out to Eric from above her mantle, and he pauses to look at it while she checks on something in the kitchen. “You like to travel, huh?” he asks.  


“I do,” she says. “Though I hardly get to go. When I have time off, I usually end up just taking lame weekend trips back home or something, anymore.” She walks out carrying two glasses of the red wine, and Eric takes one appreciatively. “My ex-fiance worked for a travel agency, actually, so we used to go for cheap, all kinds of places.”  


“Yeah? Where was your favorite?”  


She smiles. “Probably Hawaii,” she says. “I know it’s cliché, but — it was just gorgeous there. And it felt so removed from everything here. All of the stress, you know.”  


He nods. “I can imagine. We, uh, actually, we’ve been talking about taking a trip down there,” he says, remembering Ari’s suggestion. “Just to relax, while Vince is getting back on his feet.”  


“It’d be a wonderful place for it,” she says. “How’s he doing?”  


Eric smiles and puts his hand on Claire’s waist. She’s such a nice girl. “He’s fine,” he says. “You know, if we go down there, you ought to come along.” She blinks, and he rushes forward. “Just for the weekend or something. I mean, we could fly you down. It’d be fun.”  


She laughs. “You know, I sort of forgot who you work for.”  


“It has its privileges.”  


They have baked lemon chicken and wild rice for dinner, something Claire admits she picked up from Whole Foods, and they manage to finish the whole bottle of wine. They’re making out on the couch when Claire’s roommate gets home, and after an awkward moment of uncertainty where Eric wonders if maybe he should just cut and run, Claire leads him back to her bedroom. She’s got a nice body — curvy like Kristen but leaner and longer — and Eric can tell she’s really into him so he tries very hard to make things good for her. He remembers Vince telling him he’s a pretty gentle guy and tries to shake his voice away by kissing Claire more frantically. She groans, and so does he, and when that doesn’t work to chase Vince’s voice from his head he closes his eyes. They both start to pant and rock in tandem, Claire’s hands gripped tightly around his back, and Eric is not — resolutely, firmly, absolutely _not_ — thinking of Vince when he comes.  


  


He is, however, thinking of Vince when he wakes up the next morning in Claire’s bed to the sound of his phone ringing. The shower is on down the hall, so he leans over, finds his phone in his pants pocket, and answers. “Yeah?”  


“How’s our boy?” Ari asks. “You manage to give him ebola yet?”  


“Fuck you, Ari,” Eric says. “He’s fine, we saw the doctor yesterday.”  


“Which is why I’m calling. Did he give you an all-systems-go timeline? Any ideas on when he’ll be back on the market?”  


“That’s up to Vince,” Eric says, stretching. He finds his boxers and pulls them on. “Why?”  


“Because I’ve got something you and I should talk about,” Ari says. “If he’s going to be solid in a few months, that is.”  


Eric sighs. “What is it?”  


“Rhymes with Spielberg,” Ari says, and Eric catches his breath.  


“No way.”  


“Yeah way. He’s doing _Rockets’ Red Glare_. You read it? Big war great romance blah blah blah Oscar. One of the guys at Amblin heard Vince is off Keyword, called today to ask whether he might be up for filming come summer.”  


“Jesus,” Eric says. “I — I’ll have to talk to him, but — holy shit, Ari.”  


“Don’t say anything yet,” Ari warns. “Just — you know, get a feel for the time. OK? I don’t want to get his hopes up if this isn’t going to pan out.”  


“Is it going to pan out?”  


“I’ll work my motherfucking ass off for it every second from now until they slap the restraining order on.”  


“So business as usual,” Eric says, but he’s grinning. “This is amazing, Ari. Man.”  


“Just try not to kill my number one client before I get him the break of his career, all right, E?”  


He hangs up before Eric can respond, so he’s left with the cell phone in his hand and a huge, dopey smile on his face. It’s this, and not the phone, that seems to catch Claire’s eye as she walks in.  


“Hey, you,” she says, and Eric slides the phone onto the bedside stand.  


“Hey,” he says, accepting a kiss on the cheek. He needs to brush his teeth something terrible. “Uh, good morning.”  


“Yeah,” she says, grinning. She’s wearing just a yellow robe, and her hair is damp and fresh-smelling. “I wasn’t sure you’d be up already.”  


“I’m surprised I am,” he says, squinting at the clock. It’s only 7. “Wow, what are you doing up?”  


“I have to work,” she says. “Which, I know, it cuts the morning kind of short. I’m sorry.”  


“Me, too,” he says, though in his head, he’s already out the door, in his car, on the way to talk to Vince about the possibility of working for Spielberg that summer. “But, hey, there’s this weeked, still, if you want to get together.”  


“I do,” she says. She kisses him gently. “Thanks for coming over,” she says.  


He tries to remember where he is, tries to smile like he’s happy to be there. “Thanks for letting me stay.”  



	8. Chapter 8

Fifteen minutes later, he’s actually in his car, and thirty after that he’s back at home. He’s so focused on Ari’s call and the possible ramifications that when Drama looks up at him from the breakfast table and says, “So how was it?” he flinches and has to pause to think what he’s talking about.  


“Oh,” he says, “fine. It was — I mean, good.”  


“I’m not asking about the menu, E,” Drama says. “You get laid or not?”  


“Yeah,” he says, with no desire to run through the details. “Vince up yet?”  


Drama shrugs. “Maybe. He crashed pretty early last night.”  


Eric nods. He grabs a bottle of juice from the fridge and heads for Vince’s room, pushing the door open gently. Vince is still asleep, on his side, facing into the bed. Eric walks in, thinking he might just stretch out next to him and get a little extra sleep himself, but what he sees makes him stop.  


Vince’s pillow, which should be a tawny golden color, is instead smeared with red and brown. Eric drops the juice. “Vince,” he says, and shakes his shoulder. There’s a crust of blood around one of his nostrils. “Vin, wake up!”  


“Wha?”  


“Vince!”  


Vince’s eyes snap open, and he grabs Eric’s arm. “Jesus Christ, E, what —”  


“Your nose is bleeding,” Eric says, ridiculously relieved just to see Vince conscious. Up close, the blood stain is actually very small, just well-smeared. “Jesus, I thought — I don’t know what I thought,” he says.  


Vince sits up and dabs at his nose, winces. “What the hell,” he murmurs. He stands up slowly and heads for his bathroom. Eric hears him curse, then follows him, not even realizing until he gets there that he’s holding Vince’s bloody pillow to his chest. “Shit,” Vince says, looking at the pillow, and then he sits on the edge of the bathtub. He spits once into the toilet bowl.  


“Are you OK?”  


Vince gives him a terribly tired look. “Remind me what that would feel like.”  


Fair point. “Is it still bleeding?”  


“I don’t think so,” Vince murmurs, touching his face.  


“We gotta call Graber.”  


Vince nods. “Go ahead.”  


So Eric calls and talks to Graber, who says it’s not that out of the norm for someone with Vince’s blood counts to have some bleeding problems like this. “Make sure he gets his injection today, all right? If he starts again, get some ice on it, and if it lasts longer than 10 minutes, you get him to a hospital right away.”  


Eric takes a seat next to Vince on the edge of the tub. “He says it’s not unusual.”  


Vince shakes his head. “Would’ve been nice to have some warning,” he says. He has a washcloth, now, and is dabbing it carefully to his face. “I feel like I’m fucking falling apart.”  


“Not for too much longer, at least,” Eric says, and Vince just sighs.  


“I’m gonna take a shower,” he says after a minute, and Eric clears out to the bedroom. He sits on the bed and strips the pillowcase, but the pillow has a drop of blood on it, too, so he stuffs the whole thing under the bed. They’ll get more. Fuck, Vince can have the pillows off Eric’s bed if he wants them. He’ll learn to fucking knit new ones if he has to.  


Vince comes out with a towel around his waist, rubbing another over his hair, and it should be sexy. It really should. But all Eric can see is the slight sink of his skin against his ribs, the new bruises on his calves and shoulders, the way the color seems to have faded from him over the past month. He swallows and makes himself whistle, but Vince doesn’t even react.  


“How was your night?” Eric asks, leaning against the headboard as Vince walks over to his bureau.  


“Fine,” he says. He tugs a long-sleeved T-shirt on, then sits on the side of the bed to slide on his shorts. Eric kind of misses the days of watching Vince strut around naked, or even just seeing him jump around trying to put his shirt and jeans and everything on all at once. Vince lays back to pull his pants up, then just stays lying there, one hand against his face.  


“Vince?”  


“I’m so fucking tired, E,” he says. “I just woke up, but — I’m wiped out.”  


“You sleep OK?”  


“No,” Vince murmurs. “I lay here, I start thinking, I start feeling shitty, everything gets worse. I move around, I start feeling shitty, everything gets worse.” He blinks, turns his head to stare at Eric. “I don’t know what to do.”  


Eric nods. Getting Vince’s head in the right place is something he actually has experience with. “I do,” he says. “Come up here.” Vince shifts around so he’s laying the right way in the bed, and he puts his head on the clean pillow next to Eric, lying on his back. “Close your eyes.” Vince does as he’s told. Eric’s leg is against Vince’s biceps, and he rests his hand on Vince’s shoulder. “Remember the time in seventh grade you wanted to dye your hair for that Christmas pageant? And your mom said no, so you brought it to my house, and my sister ended up in trouble for it?”  


“Yeah,” Vince says, and what Eric hears is: _go on_. So he does: he tells old stories and new, he talks of people from the neighborhood and people from town. When he still doesn’t feel like he’s getting through, he slides down the bed and onto his side, and Vince turns, too, and they spoon up and Eric keeps talking, softly, into the warm juncture between Vince’s neck and shoulder. When Vince’s breathing evens, gets deeper, he stops, finally, but doesn’t move away; in fact, he doesn’t move at all until he hears the door open, and then he glances over only briefly to confirm it’s Turtle. He flashes an OK sign, and Turtle closes the door again. When he’s gone, Eric shifts, starts to ease himself out of the bed, but Vince stirs.  


“Stay here,” Vince murmurs, holding Eric’s arms to his chest. “OK?”  


“Sure,” Eric says. “Whatever you need.”  


  


Vince seems to be feeling about the same that evening. He says his stomach feels fine and is even able to eat a turkey sandwich and one of the vanilla protein drinks for dinner, but he’s still so tired it’s actually visible on him, the way his hands shake and his head seems to just be hanging off his shoulders. He favors his left arm some, too, because it’s the arm that they’ve been injecting his new drug into. The fatigue worries Eric more than anything else has so far. As the night goes on, he makes Vince get up every few hours to walk the full length of the house just to prove that he can.  


“When did you start hating me?” Vince grouses, falling on to the couch.  


“E’s a leg man,” Drama says, throwing a blanket over Vince. “He’s just trying to make sure you don’t lose any tone.”  


“Very fucking funny, Drama,” Eric says, but it makes Vince smile.  


At bedtime, Eric goes with Vince, because there’s a new silent agreement between them: Vince isn’t sleeping alone anymore. In fact, Eric’s not sure he should go to sleep, himself; what if Vince has another nosebleed in the night? Shouldn’t Eric watch out, stay awake? But Vince curls up close to him, sharing his pillow, and Eric decides that surely, he’ll wake up if anything happens. He rests his hand on Vince’s arm just in case.  


Vince sleeps through the night, as far as Eric can tell. When he wakes, Eric’s already been up for two hours, sitting and watching the television on mute. He’s missed two calls from Ari, but he can’t make himself check his messages. He needs to tell Vince about the film, but he’s worried Vince will say no. He’s worried Vince will pass on Spielberg just out of exhaustion.  


“Morning,” Vince says, his voice hoarse. He touches his own face, gently, and Eric realizes he must be checking for blood. Finding none, he looks up at Eric, then scoots close and rests his head on his thigh, facing the television.  


“Hey,” Eric says. He runs his fingers through Vince’s hair. “How do you feel?” Vince shrugs. “You hungry? It’s almost lunch time.”  


“Maybe in a bit,” Vince says. He puts his hand on Eric’s calf, just below his knee, and squeezes gently. Eric hears him yawn. “Jesus, almost lunch time?”  


It’s 12:30, and Eric’s stomach’s been growling for the last hour, but he doesn’t mention this. “I think Drama’s gonna make spaghetti,” he says. It’s one of the only things Vince will eat. “Come on, you gotta be a little hungry.”  


“Let me wake up some more.”  


Eric agrees to that. He slides his hand down to rub Vince’s shoulders, and Vince gives an appreciative groan. On the television, the weather report comes up, promising sunshine and light winds for the day.  


“I think we should go to Hawaii,” Vince says.  


“Yeah?” He nods. “Uh, when?”  


“Whenever Graber says it’s OK.” He turns around so he’s looking up at Eric. The neck of his T-shirt is stretched out, and Eric’s hand slides as Vince turns so that his fingers are against Vince’s collarbone. His skin is cool to the touch. “I want to get out of here for a while.”  


“Sure, yeah,” Eric says. “I’ll talk to him. And Ari. We’ll get it set up.”  


“OK.” Vince closes his eyes and lifts his hand and picks up Eric’s, wraps his fingers over Eric’s and draws it down against his chest, holds it there. He doesn’t say anything, looks like maybe he’s going back to sleep.  


“Vince?”  


Vince murmurs, “Mm-hm.”  


“You, uh, OK?”  


“Yeah.” He keeps his eyes closed. “You have any plans today?”  


“No,” he says. “I don’t think so.”  


“Maybe, don’t go anywhere tonight, OK?” Vince moves his head just slightly, like he’s settling in. “Is that OK?”  


“Sure,” Eric says.  


“OK,” Vince says. “Good.”  


He’s still just holding Eric’s hand, like that’s something they’ve ever done before. Eric feels weird about it, as though he should be worried. “You wanna get up for lunch?” he asks.  


“Nah.”  


“Why, you feel sick?”  


“Just tired,” Vince says, turning his head a little so his forehead presses against the inside of Eric’s wrist. “It’s like it hurts just to be awake.”  


“You just got up,” Eric says. “Maybe you’ll feel better if you move around a little.”  


“I don’t think so,” Vince says. He opens his eyes, draws his head back. “If you want to bring the food in here, I’ll eat. I mean, I’ll try. But I’m not going all the way out there.”  


“Come on,” Eric says. “You ought to move around a little at least.”  


“No,” Vince says, pulling his hand away. He stays curled up, closes his eyes again, but he lowers his head off of Eric’s leg, onto the bed. The distance feels enormous. “I’m staying here.”  


Eric takes a deep breath. “You want me to call Graber, see if there’s something else we should do?”  


“What’s he gonna do, give me magic energy pills?” Vince asks. His voice is high, his words coming fast. He sounds panicky and, somehow, angry, at the same time. “You think he’s been holding back on a miracle cure? Maybe if we ask nicely —”  


“Vin, hey.” He sits closer, so he’s looking right down at Vince. “Ease up.”  


“You ease up,” he sneers.  


“Hey,” Eric says, startled. “You’re sort of scaring me.”  


“Yeah? Well, I’m scared all the time.” Vince lifts his head onto his own arm, and his voice gets muffled. “I’ve been waking up scared and going to bed scared for a month, now.” His eyes are still closed, but his breath is coming fast, and his hands are both clenched into fists. Either he’s in pain — and Eric’s stomach clenches at that thought — or he’s about to cry.  


That can’t happen. He puts his hand on Vince’s wrist. “It’s gonna be all right, man,” he says.  


“Shut up,” Vince says, his voice like a sigh. “God, I’m so tired of hearing that.”  


“What can —”  


“There’s nothing you can do,” Vince says. “Stop fucking asking.”  


Eric draws back. All he knows to do is the same stuff he’s been doing — taking care of Vince, keeping an eye out. If Vince doesn’t want him to do that, he’s not sure what’s left for him. He shifts to his right, swings his legs over the side of the bed. His left foot’s asleep, probably from Vince’s head resting on his leg. He rubs his calf.  


“Where are you going?” Vince asks, sounding sulky.  


“To get some food,” Eric says. He can’t muster a fighting tone; all he feels is exhausted. He hears Vince sigh, and turns back. “I’ll bring you some,” he says gently.  


“Fuck you,” Vince mutters. He crawls across the bed and turns his back on Eric, rests his head back on his pillow. Eric stares at the knob of his spine visible at the neck of his shirt. He’s got no energy to fight Vince with and doesn’t want to. Vince is sick and sad, and suddenly it’s Eric that’s in danger of crying. He gets up and walks out without looking back, pauses in the guest bathroom to splash some water on his face. When he gets out, he follows the sounds of Turtle and Drama to the kitchen.  


They look up as he walks in, and Eric rubs his face. Every time they see him, it’s like they think he’s bringing good news, like he’s going to walk in and say Vince is cured, Vince wants to party. He takes a seat at the table and can read the questions in the guys’ eyes. “How was the other night?” he asks, hearing the dullness in his own voice.  


“Fine,” Drama says. He sets a bowl of spaghetti in front of Eric, and Eric looks up at him. “He was weird,” he says. “Tired, I guess, and kind of antsy.”  


“Seriously,” Turtle says, “you gotta let me smoke him up.”  


“Whatever you want,” Eric says. He takes a bite of the spaghetti. Fuck, he’s hungry. He’s hungry, he’s thirsty, his neck hurts from sitting against the headboard, trying not to move. He needs a shower, a shave, a drink, and a fucking vacation. He feels bad for even thinking it.  


“Vince up?” Drama asks.  


Eric shrugs. “Sort of.”  


“I’m gonna take him some lunch, OK?”  


“You can try.” Now the sourness has found its way into his voice. It’s OK to be angry with Drama. Drama doesn’t have cancer. “Good fucking luck.”  


Turtle takes a seat across from him and sets a soda down. Eric nods. He concentrates on his pasta. It’s good, kind of sweet, like Vince likes it. Eric eats his whole bowl, gets up to get himself seconds, and carries it out to the deck to eat. The sunshine feels good. Fuck it, he thinks, there’s no reason that he has to stay inside every second. It’s not like Vince even wants to see him right now.  


He finishes the pasta and gets out his phone. First he calls Ari and leaves a message with Lloyd, just some bullshit about needing a little more time to get things figured out. Ari should know that code. He understands Vince pretty well, after all these years; he’d never admit it, but Eric knows Ari trusts him to get Vince’s head back in the right place. “How is he?” Lloyd asks.  


“He’s fine,” Eric says, his standard line. “He’s in good spirits, Lloyd, I’ll tell him you asked.”  


He hangs up and stares out at the pool, the ocean beyond it. There’s an angry voice in his head that says he should just get his suit, jump in, just fucking relax. Or he should call Claire — he really should call her, after all, since the next-day call is basically mandatory. He flips his phone open again and looks up her number, then calls. When her voice mail picks up, he feels relieved, and leaves a brief, apologetic message, promising to call tomorrow. Then he hears himself say, “If Vince is feeling better -” and can’t finish the sentence. He stutters through a good-bye and hangs up.  


Everything depends on Vince feeling better — on Vince _getting_ better. Whatever rules Vince has made, Eric has some of his own: his life is on hold until Vince is well again. He shouldn’t have called Claire. He shouldn’t have slept with her. He doesn’t want to deal with anyone else right now, doesn’t want to have to fake being nice or interested or any of that. The only thing he cares about is getting Vince through this.  


He pockets his phone and takes his bowl inside, and there he sees Vince sitting at the kitchen table. The bowl of pasta in front of him is full, but there’s a fork in his hand and his water glass is nearly empty. Eric falls into the chair next to him, doesn’t think about Drama or Turtle being around, just rests his head on Vince’s shoulder. Vince nods and takes a bite of his pasta. Eric can hear him chewing and swallowing, slow, like it hurts.  


Drama clears his throat, but Eric doesn’t move.  


“You guys need anything?” Turtle asks.  


Vince shakes his head and takes another bite, and Eric closes his eyes. The guys leave. He puts his hand on Vince’s thigh and just rests there. “You OK?” Vince asks, and Eric laughs and draws back.  


“It’s good, huh?” he says, pointing at the pasta. Vince nods and makes it through another couple of bites before he pushes it away. Eric doesn’t protest. Vince is doing the best that he can.  


“I need my shot,” Vince says quietly.  


“Yeah,” Eric says. “OK.”  


It takes him a few minutes to get up and get the Tylenol that Vince needs to take first, then he finds the syringe and the alcohol swabs and goes back to the table. Vince puts his head down and stretches his arm out, and Eric draws up his sleeve. There’s still an appealing swell of muscle beneath the T-shirt. Eric just rests his hand there. He doesn’t want to do this, suddenly. Not now. He doesn’t want to hurt Vince at all.  


“Hey,” Vince says, turning his head. Eric meets his eyes. “Sorry about earlier.”  


“You don’t — you don’t have anything —” Eric clears his throat. “Fuck, Vin.”  


Vince’s smile is almost like his old smile, lazy and kind of cocky. “You talk to Ari about Hawaii?”  


“Not yet,” Eric says. He tears the alcohol pad open and swabs a small, clean circle on Vince’s biceps. Vince puts his head back down. “Lloyd said to tell you hello, though.”  


“Lloyd’s good people,” Vince says. “I miss him. I miss —”  


The hiss of the word gets prolonged as Eric sinks the syringe into Vince’s arm. He can see Vince’s hands clench but there’s nothing he can do, just inject the Neulasta clean and get it out and over with. Vince swears very quietly.  


Eric throws the syringe into the special plastic trash bin they have, then goes back to the table. He puts his hands on Vince’s shoulders and rubs gently. “I’m OK,” Vince says.  


“You want to go back to bed?”  


It takes a second, but Vince nods, and he leans on Eric a little to walk back down the hall. “Hey,” Vince says as they pass through the doorway. “How was your night with Claire, anyway?”  


Eric shrugs and helps him to the bed. “OK,” he says.  


Vince sits on the edge of the bed and rubs his face. He yawns. Eric takes up his old place at the headboard, fusses with the remote control on the night stand. Vince turns and stretches out, his head on the pillow beside Eric’s hip. “OK meaning you got laid?”  


“Yeah.”  


Vince laughs. “How was it?”  


“Terrible,” Eric says, and Vince raises his head just slightly. “I kept thinking about you, jackass,” he says, and Vince puts his head back down, but shifts closer. Eric slides his hand up into Vince’s hair.  


“Because you were worried?”  


“Because you’re the last person I had sex with,” he says.  


“Pretty memorable, huh?” Vince says. “Hmm.” He lays his head on Eric’s thigh again. “OK if I’m here, or you gonna get hard?”  


“No promises,” Eric says. He feels ridiculously relieved. They’re back to where they were this morning. They’re back to Vince needing him, wanting him to be around. He rubs his fingers through Vince’s hair slowly, stroking it back from his face. Vince’s eyes close. “I don’t want you to be scared,” he says quietly.  


“E —”  


“I’m gonna take care of you, OK? Just — you gotta let me.” Vince smiles, just a little, but doesn’t open his eyes. Eric reaches over and pulls on the blankets until they come free, then he tugs them up around Vince’s shoulders. When he puts his hand back down, Vince grabs it, and this time Eric lets him hold it without concern.  



	9. Chapter 9

Things get better. The next day, Vince has a little more energy — though, Eric has to admit, this might be because Eric eases up on him, too, doesn’t make him walk around or get out of bed when he doesn’t want to. It might also be because Vince seems to be trying to apologize to Eric by eating and drinking regularly, even when he’s tired. The day after that, Vince feels well enough to spend part of the day on the couch, wrapped in a blanket, rousing himself to play video games with Turtle. By Thursday, he asks Eric to help him put on sunscreen and they lounge outside for part of the day, and Vince looks not just comfortable but actually, briefly, happy again. It’s more than Eric could ask for.  


Friday, they have another meeting with Graber to check Vince’s blood counts. The lab is backed up, so they go in early to get Vince’s blood drawn and then drive back home to wait for the results. As they get out of the car, Eric’s phone rings: Claire. He’s been carefully calling her during the times when she’s working all week and dodging her calls the rest of the time. Vince glances over at him, and Eric shrugs and silences the phone.  


“What?” he says, holding the door.  


“Claire?” Vince asks. When Eric nods, Vince gives him a funny look. “What, you’re just going to ignore her, E? That’s not like you.”  


“Yeah, well, I’m out of sorts,” Eric says. In the kitchen, he finds and orange and slices it. Turtle gets a beer from the fridge while Vince sits at the island and snags a piece of the orange.  


“You gotta at least call her,” he says. “I mean, it’s not like you can avoid her forever, and I don’t want a girl with access to my medical records pissed off.”  


Eric nods. “I kind of — I told her we might go to Hawaii.”  


“Yeah? You invite her down?” Vince asks, cool, easy, casual.  


“Jesus, why didn’t I think of that,” Turtle says, “I bet I totally could have closed with that girl at Pure if I’d said I’d take her to Hawaii.”  


“Not even if you owned Hawaii,” Eric says, and Vince snickers.  


“Seriously, though, man, call her,” Vince says. He takes another piece from the orange and pops it in his mouth, says he’s going to take a shower. That probably means he’s also going to take a nap, which isn’t such a bad idea; Turtle heads to the living room to do the same thing. Eric throws the rest of the orange away, then realizes he’ll need to give Vince his shot in about an hour. That’s something he actually wants to do even less than call Claire. He picks up the phone and heads upstairs.  


“I was starting to wonder,” she says, and her voice is warm enough that he knows immediately he’s off the hook.  


“I’m so sorry,” he says. “Vince — he had a rough couple of days, and I just, it was hard to find time —”  


“Eric, I get it,” she says. “I’m sorry I missed your calls, too. Work has been insane.”  


He sighs and falls back onto his bed, staring at the ceiling. “So — uh, how are you?”  


“Fine,” she says. “Getting ready for work, at the moment.”  


“Oh, I’m sorry,” he says. “Do you need to —”  


“Nah, you can keep me company while I get dressed,” she says.  


Eric makes himself chuckle. “I like the sound of that,” he says.  


They chat just idly, talking about her work, mostly, and her roommate that he met so briefly the other night. When she says, “What does your weekend look like?” he sits up. She sounds so earnest and eager, so excited to see him. He swallows.  


“Actually, I’m waiting to hear,” he says. “If the doctor clears it, we might go to Hawaii.”  


“Yeah?”  


“Yeah,” he says. “Listen, I was serious. You should visit. Even if it’s just a couple of days, we can fly you down.”  


She laughs, clearly delighted. “I’ll — I’ll see what I can work out, here,” she says. “It sounds amazing.”  


“It will be, if you come down,” Eric says. He realizes even as he says it that he sounds like some terrible hybrid between Vince and Turtle, using lines like this. Suddenly, he just wants things to be over; he wants to be off the phone. “Hey, my other line is ringing,” he says. “I’m sorry to —”  


“No, it’s OK, I should get going, too. I’ll — talk to you again soon?”  


“Soon,” he says. “Sooner than last time, I promise.”  


“Have a good day, Eric.”  


“You, too.” He hangs up and flops backward onto his bed, closes his eyes. Fuck, fuck, fuck, he thinks, and he’s not even sure why. It really shouldn’t be weird to have Claire along for a few days in Hawaii. Vince will be well enough soon to entertain himself — and any pretty locals he can find — and Turtle and Drama will most likely be absorbed again in tourist shit. Without a girlfriend along, Eric will probably be stuck playing fifth wheel to Vince and his girls or the other guys and their schemes. This should be making him happy. But all he feels, thinking of the trip ahead, is tired; all he wants is a vacation from worrying.  


His arm itches, and he scratches it. Instead of rolling over, though, he sits up and stares at the door to his room. Well, why the fuck not, he thinks, and gets up and walks to Vince’s room. Vince is asleep under the covers, snoring a little, and Eric isn’t really tired, but he lays next to him. He isn’t really tired, he tells himself again, and then he falls asleep, his hand on top of the blanket over Vince’s arm.  


The phone wakes them both. Eric doesn’t bother answering; it’s the house phone, Turtle will get it. Instead, he stretches and gets up and hits the john, and when he walks out he finds Vince on the phone. He picks up the extension and hears Graber saying “—pretty good, all things considered.”  


“Yeah?” Vince says. “This week has been better, I guess.”  


“I’m glad to hear that. You’re on the downslope, now. In fact, I think we can take you off the Neulasta when you run out.”  


There are four vials left. Eric feels relieved already. “So everything looks OK?” he asks.  


“Hello, Eric. Yes, things look fine. Everything’s within normal levels.”  


“That’s great news,” Eric says. Vince leans his head against the headboard, still holding the phone but, from the looks of it, barely listening. “So, uh, we were thinking about maybe getting out of town for a while. Would that be OK?”  


“Where to?”  


Eric explains the Hawaii plan, and Graber is enthusiastic. “Absolutely,” he says, “at this point, keeping your spirits up is as important as anything we can do for you here. I’d like to see you again as soon as you’re back, and you should make an appointment with McNaight for about the same time, too, but I don’t see any reason you can’t go.”  


“Thanks, Doc,” Eric says, and Vince murmurs the same thing before they hang up.  


“So,” Eric says, sitting on the bed, and Vince opens his eyes.  


“Hawaii.” Vince wags his eyebrows a few times but it’s strange, almost pathetic.  


“We don’t have to go if you’re not up to it,” Eric says. “We can put it off, or —”  


“No, I want to,” Vince says. He yawns. “Good to get away from here, I think.”  


“When do you wanna leave?”  


“Tomorrow,” Vince suggests. “Set it up?”  


“Yeah. You going to sleep?”  


“For a bit. I’m kind of tired,” Vince says. Eric stands to take his phone into the kitchen, but Vince says, “Stay in here, all right? You won’t keep me up.”  


So he sits again on the bed to make a call to their travel agent, and soon he’s got a private jet booked to Hawaii, a beachfront resort bungalow reserved, transportation guaranteed. And, for good measure, once he’s sure Vince is sleeping, he asks about hospitals in the area, finds out they aren’t far from a level-one trauma center. Just in case anything goes wrong. He hangs up, satisfied, and then just stays there. Just sitting there, in case Vince needs anything, in case there’s anything left to do.  


Eventually, he dozes again, apparently, because when he wakes that evening, Vince is draped over him, looking down at him seriously. “What’s up?” Eric asks, yawning.  


Vince tips forward and kisses him before Eric can even react. It’s not a big kiss, just Vince’s dry lips against Eric’s, but when Eric pulls back Vince kisses him again, open-mouthed, with tongue. Eric’s mind flickers around — this could make him sick! What the fuck? — and then he sees Vince’s eyes.  


“I’ve been sleeping with you for days,” Vince says. “If I was gonna catch something —”  


“I thought you were tired.” Eric rests his hands on Vince’s back.  


“Yeah, so take it slow,” Vince says, and kisses him again.  


For a while, they just do that — just kissing, Vince’s hands cupping Eric’s face, Eric’s rubbing Vince’s back gently. Vince is a good kisser, and Eric likes kissing him, even with a day’s beard scratching against his skin. He shifts his legs to give Vince a little more room, and his dick — about half-erect — rubs against Vince’s belly.  


Vince draws back and frowns. “What?” Eric asks.  


He shifts, first sideways, then up and down. His frown stays in place, and Eric touches his neck. “Vince?”  


“I’m not hard,” he says.  


Now Eric frowns. He doesn’t have any good response for that. “Yeah?”  


Vince shakes his head. He scoots up, just a little, and — now Eric can feel it, Vince’s soft cock against his own thigh. “Well, maybe I can help,” Eric says, sliding his hands to Vince’s waist. Vince nods, but his jaw is clenched. No go, Eric thinks. He could probably go down on Vince right now and as wound up as he is, it would be a disaster. He tries, anyway, slips his hands into Vince’s shorts and runs his fingers down the length of Vince’s penis. There’s a promising twitch, at first, but then — nothing. Vince groans and rolls away, Eric’s hand still caught in his shorts.  


“Maybe it’s too soon,” Eric says, leaning on one elbow to look down at him. His other hand stays at the top of Vince’s thigh, his fingers still brushing Vince’s limp dick.  


“Fuck,” Vince whispers.  


“You’ve had one since the surgery, right?” Vince stays quiet. “OK. Hey. We can call McNaight. We can talk to —”  


“Christ.” Vince jerks his leg, and Eric pulls his hand away. “No, we’re not talking to anyone.”  


“OK,” Eric says. “What do you want to do?”  


“Wake up and be better,” Vince says, his eyes closing. “This is all a nightmare. Everything — what do you think I did, huh, to deserve this shit?”  


“It doesn’t work like that,” Eric says. “You know that. If it did, half the guys at our high school would’ve has this when they were 16, all the shit they pulled. If this was some kind of cosmic balancing force, Dom would’ve had both balls removed by middle school.”  


Vince’s jaw is still clenched. “You can’t make me feel better about this unless you can get me off.”  


“I can get you dinner,” Eric says, “and a movie. It’s what I used to get instead of sex in high school.”  


He doesn’t say anything, and Eric gets that right now, Vince probably needs to be alone more than anything. Having someone there to be sympathetic is no great help, particularly if that guy’s hard. So he gets up and says, “You want more pasta?” and takes Vince’s silence for a yes.  


Drama makes spaghetti again without complaint, and Turtle doesn’t bitch when Eric sends him out for more ginger ale, particularly after Eric tells them both to pack their bags for Hawaii. He sits in the kitchen and drinks a beer, slowly, and when Turtle gets back from the store he tells him to get the bong ready. Eric goes back to Vince’s room and says, “Come on, dinner,” and Vince looks at him for a long minute.  


“What? Fuck, I didn’t tell them, come on,” Eric says, and Vince nods and gets up from the bed.  


They eat, they smoke, and Drama puts in _Kill Bill_ , the first one. Vince is sitting next to Eric on the couch, slouched low. Eric reaches back and pulls the blanket he’s been using lately down over him. Vince looks over, one eyebrow raised, and Eric says, “It’s cold in here, right?” and pulls the blanket over his own lap, too. On screen, the Bride cuts a baseball in half, and when Turtle laughs Eric slides his hand onto Vince’s leg under the blanket. He keeps his eyes forward, but turns all of his attention to Vince — the little shift he makes at first, the way he tenses up, and then, when Eric gently rubs his hand up Vince’s thigh and across his lower belly, the sigh. Vince slouches a little more, and Eric slides his hand into Vince’s shorts. He’s not hard, now, either, but it only takes a minute; Eric pulls away just for a second, to get his hand damp on the side of his beer, and Vince hisses and then coughs to cover that noise when Eric puts his hand back. The guys are right there, the movie isn’t that loud, and this is seriously the most daring thing that Eric has done in, well, a long fucking time, but it feels pretty good. When he lets himself look over, Vince has his head tipped just slightly forward, and Eric can see where his tongue is caught between his front teeth. Eric jerks a little faster.  


Then Drama turns, before Eric can pull his hand away, and says, “Hey, anybody want popcorn?”  


Eric, his hand still on Vince’s cock, says, “You know what, that sounds great.”  


“Pause it, Turtle,” Drama says, and stands up.  


Vince clears his throat. Eric doesn’t move; he hopes Drama doesn’t hit the lights. “Turtle, could I get another ginger ale?” Vince asks, his voice remarkably clear.  


“Yeah, I’ll get it,” Turtle says. He stands and reaches over, and Eric can’t help it, his hand jerks and Vince coughs again to hide a little gasp. Turtle grabs the bong that’s on the table in front of them. “Can you a wait a minute, or you want it right now? I’m gonna wash this out, that last hit was off.”  


“I can wait,” Vince says, and Eric almost laughs. The minute Turtle’s out of the room, Eric turns to Vince, and Vince says, “Don’t fucking stop now.”  


So Eric leans closer, getting a better angle, and it only takes a few more tugs before Vince comes, groaning, his hand fisting in Eric’s shirt. Vince is shaking, which surprises and kind frightens Eric; after he wipes his hand off on a corner of the blanket, he’s even more surprised when Vince puts his arm around Eric’s chest and pushes him down onto the couch. “OK,” Eric murmurs, kissing Vince’s now-sweaty forehead. Vince doesn’t kiss him or even say anything, he just, well, cuddles up with Eric, and when the guys come back out that’s how they are, Vince half-asleep on his chest, his hand rubbing up and down Eric’s ribs.  


“Here’s your ginger ale, Vin,” Turtle says. He doesn’t blink at their position, and neither does Drama when he walks in with two huge bowls of popcorn.  


“You feeling OK, bro?” he asks, stopping in the doorway. “The smell bother you?”  


“I feel great,” Vince murmurs, and that does something for Eric, makes something loosen in his chest, makes him feel like maybe he’s actually helping. Like maybe things are really, really getting better; like maybe things are going to be OK.  


  


They leave the next afternoon for Hawaii. It’s night by the time they arrive, and Vince, who looked a little pale on the flight, needs to go straight to bed. Eric puts his hand on Vince’s shoulder in the limo and Vince nods, leans against him as if to say he’ll be fine. They get to the resort and the driver takes them right around to their bungalow, where someone is waiting to unlock the place for them. The guys volunteer to handle checking in and handling the bags, so Eric helps Vince out and they walk inside. Eric doesn’t even look around, just concentrates on making sure Vince is OK.  


“This place is all right,” Vince says. His words are kind of thick. Fuck, what were they thinking, putting a guy this tired through a day of travel.  


“Up here,” Eric says, and they take two steps up into a wide, wood-floored hallway and find a bedroom at the end. Vince kicks off his sandals and then sinks onto the bed, rolling onto his side, and Eric stops to take stock. It’s a nice room, not huge but somehow luxurious, with an attached bathroom and sliding doors opening onto a deck, the walls done with something like linen, the floors a high shiny bamboo. The bed is broad, white-sheeted, and comfortable looking, and there are two lightweight khaki blankets stacked to the side. Eric fills a glass with water in the bathroom, then closes the curtains on his way back to the bed. Vince hasn’t moved.  


“You OK?” Eric asks.  


“Long fucking flight,” Vince says. He turns onto his stomach, and Eric grabs one of the blankets and drapes it over him. “I’m just wiped out.”  


“Travel can do that.” Eric sits on the edge of the bed and rubs his back, and Vince murmurs appreciatively. “I bet we could get you a real masseuse tomorrow, if you want.”  


“Hm-mm.”  


“Anything specific you want to do?”  


“Just rest,” Vince says, and Eric feels relieved by that. Vince turns his head so he’s facing Eric’s direction, but his eyes stay closed. “I feel like I’ve been sick forever,” he says. “I guess it’s not even that long, huh?”  


“Too long.” Vince’s voice is sleepy, and Eric slows his hand, just sort of stroking Vince’s back, now, just a calming motion. He looks at the other side of the bed and, for some reason, feels like he has to ask. “You want me to stay in here?”  


“Yeah,” Vince says quietly, after a minute. “If you want.”  


“Yeah, sure,” Eric says, like it’s no big thing, like it’s just a favor, and not like it’s something he would have fought for. He’s not sure, right now, he could sleep down the hall from Vince, not Vince like this, tired and worried and still sick. But he’d never say that to the guy, and that’s probably why he still gets to sleep by him.  


“Hey,” Vince says, blinking like his eyelids weigh a ton, “but, look, once Claire’s here, I won’t – you don’t –“  


“Just rest, all right?” Eric says, talking over Vince and the suddenly tight worry he feels in his chest.  


Turtle yells to say their bags are in the living room. By the time Eric gets back from collecting them, Vince is asleep, so Eric leaves the unpacking for later and backs out. He leaves the door open a crack, just in case Vince needs anything. The guys are watching TV in the living room, and Eric thinks, Christ, why did we come to Hawaii at all? “You get us checked in OK?”  


“Yeah,” Turtle says. “They’re having a pig roast tonight.”  


“It sounds like a total tourist trap,” Drama says, and his voice suggests that this is a good thing.  


“Yeah?”  


“We’re thinking of maybe heading over there,” Turtle says. “If, I mean —”  


“It’s cool,” Eric says. “I’ll stay with him, I don’t think he’s going anywhere tonight.”  


Turtle nods. “When does Claire get here?”  


Eric sighs, tries and fails not to think about Vince sleeping alone. “I don’t know.”  


“What, she’s still coming, right?”  


He shrugs. He needs to call her.  


Drama looks up. “What’d you do?”  


“Nothing, yet,” he says. “When are you guys leaving?”  


“Another hour,” Turtle says.  


“I’m gonna take a walk, then, if you’ll —”  


“We got it.”  


It’s strange, maybe a little sad, that it’s only taken them this long to figure these things out, to get into a nearly unspoken rhythm around the idea that someone needs to be here watching Vince. That’s maybe what Eric’s going to miss when this is all over, this excuse for supervision, this excuse for always being around. So Eric hits the beach, and walks until he can’t really see the resort behind him at all. Then he sits in the sand and pulls out his phone, stares at the ocean for a minute making a decision he knows he really made back in L.A. He calls Claire. “I was just thinking about going shopping,” she says. “My bathing suit is sort of grungy.”  


He rubs his forehead. “Claire,” he says, and he clears his throat and draws squiggles in the sand with his free hand. “I’m a jerk.”  


“You are?”  


“Yeah,” he says. “Uh — the thing is. The thing is, Vince being sick, I’ve been — I haven’t been very good to you.”  


“You’ve been great so far,” she says.  


It’s on the tip of his tongue to just come clean, to just tell her that he’s cheated on her, that he’s involved with someone else, but he’s afraid, practically, that she’ll connect the dots. And that wouldn’t be good. So he goes for the next best thing: “I think this might be bad timing.”  


“Eric, if you think it’s too weird for me to go to Hawaii —”  


“No,” he says quickly, and then, “well, yeah, it might be, but that’s more because I haven’t been honest with you. I — with everything that’s going on with Vince, I just, I’m not ready for a relationship right now.” There. He’s said it. That line that he’s heard girls use on him a hundred times before. He waits for the typical response, but gets just silence, for a moment.  


Finally, she says, “So you’re breaking up with me?”  


“I guess,” Eric says. He feels like he owes her something, like he owes as much honesty as he can manage. “I’m — mostly, I’m saying, it’s really, really, really not you. I like you, Claire. I like you a lot. But right now, my focus — it’s all on Vince. He’s been my best friend my whole life, and I need to be here for him. Maybe that’s messed up, or co-dependent, or whatever, I’ve heard all of that shit, but — I’m saying, you deserve the guy I could have been a couple months ago.”  


More silence, then she says, “I guess I should have seen this coming.”  


“No, it’s totally my fault.”  


She actually laughs. “No, I meant, the trip sounded too good to be true.”  


He frowns. “I’m sorry about that. I’m sorry about a lot of this, actually.” Again, silence. He draws a stick figure boy in the sand, wonders if he should offer her something. A ticket? Two tickets? And then, what is he, trying to buy her forgiveness? No, that’s lame. Just be honest. “I’m not sorry, uh, not about everything. Not most things. I mean, I’m glad I met you, I’m glad we — we did have a good time, right?”  


“Yeah,” she says. “Though you were pretty distracted. So I guess this isn’t as out of the blue as you think.”  


He sighs. “I am really sorry.”  


“Me, too.” He draws a little girl stick figure next to the boy, connects their hands. “I guess I’ll see you around. At the office, I mean.”  


“Yeah,” he says. He almost says, Maybe after a while we could — but he stops himself. No matter how things are with Vince after this, he’s out of commission for a while. He at least knows himself that well.  


“Take care, Eric,” she says.  


“You, too.” He hangs up, then looks down at his stick figures. He smoothes the sand over using his shoe. It only takes a second to wipe the whole drawing away, and then he stands and heads back to the bungalow. He’s so distracted he doesn’t notice that his feet are wet until he’s already back at the house.  


The guys, now in garish tropical-colored shirts, are ready to go, and Eric sees them off. At least someone’s getting the vacation they expected, he thinks, and watches them retreat down the beach.  



	10. Chapter 10

He’s sitting in the living room, not watching the television although it’s on, when Vince wanders out. It’s already dark, and the guys aren’t back yet. Vince sits next to him on the couch and tips his head backward.  


“Where’s everybody?” he asks.  


“Pig roast.”  


“You didn’t want any?”  


“They were going to meet some girls,” Eric says.  


“Ah.” Vince shifts a little, so his head is still resting on the back but now he’s facing Eric. Eric wants to ask if he feels OK, but he also doesn’t want to. “When’s Claire get here?”  


“She’s not coming.”  


Vince’s hand drops onto Eric’s shoulder. “Yeah? Sorry, man, that sucks.”  


“It’s fine,” Eric says. “We, uh, broke up, actually.”  


“Whoa, seriously?” Eric nods. “Already? Jesus, I thought she was really into you.”  


“She was.”  


“So what happened?” He shrugs, and Vince squeezes his shoulder. “E —”  


“Bad timing.” Vince’s eyes start to narrow, and Eric says quickly, “She said I was distracted.”  


Now Vince rolls his eyes. That’s old code between them — a girl who doesn’t like the guys. A girl who doesn’t like Vince. “Fuck her, huh? Jesus, you’d think she’d understand.”  


“Yeah.” Eric feels bad about the lie, but — what else is he supposed to do? “It’s fine, whatever.”  


“Yeah?”  


“Honestly, I wasn’t that into her,” Eric says. He picks up the remote and offers it to Vince. “You hungry or anything?”  


“Eh.” Vince flips through to a movie channel.  


“Terminator, seriously?”  


“I don’t really care,” he says, and drops the remote back in Eric’s lap. “Hey, how long do we have this place?”  


“A couple weeks. Basically, I think however long we want, I just have to let them know a week ahead. Why? When do you want to go back?” Not yet, Eric thinks. It hasn’t even been a day.  


“After a while.” Vince shrugs. “I was thinking maybe we should go home after this.”  


“Yeah?” He nods, and Eric nods back. “All right. Once you’ve gained some weight, man, or your mom’s gonna kick my butt.”  


“You, too,” Vince says. His hand finds its way back to Eric’s shoulder and rubs. “You worry too much, E.”  


“Ha.”  


“Seriously,” he says, and Eric swallows and looks at the television.  


He picks up his phone. “Hey, what if I see if Turtle will bring back some leftovers?”  


“And interrupt a possible romantic liaison?” Vince asks, and Eric looks back at him and they both smirk. “Yeah, all right, roast pig sounds good.”  


The guys come back early, grumbling pleasantly about all the pussy they’re missing out on, and they bring two Styrofoam trays from the resort, full of pulled pork and rice and a sweet pineapple sauce that’s fucking amazing. Vince eats almost everything in his container over the course of an hour, between hits from a joint, and then settles back and belches and sighs. Then he sits up suddenly, so suddenly that the peaceful hazy buzz Eric’s been riding is shot to hell: he’s immediately focused, his head painfully clear. “What is it? What’s wrong?” he asks, his hand already on Vince’s shoulder.  


“We forgot my shot,” Vince says. His eyes are wide when he turns back.  


“Oh,” Eric says. And then, after a second, “You know, I bet it’s OK.” He’s not an authority on this, but you know what, fuck it. They’re comfortable and Vince is happy and he’s not going to do it, not right now. “He said you could taper off, so we’ll just catch up in the morning.”  


“Two at once?” Vince asks.  


“Nah,” Eric says. “We just go on like we never missed. It’s OK.”  


Vince nods and settles back, but now he’s restless. Turtle starts telling some story about a girl in a fake grass skirt and Eric tries to nod along, ignore Vince shifting around next to him. Finally, Vince breaks in and says, “No, I think we should do it.”  


“Right now?” Eric asks.  


“Yeah. Yeah. Go get it. You packed it, right?”  


He did. It’s in his luggage next to everything else related to Vince’s illness: the Tylenol, extra gauze and bandages for his surgical wounds, just in case, the post-surgery instructions, every piece of paper they’ve been handed by McNaight or Graber or anyone, the directions to the nearest hospital. “Vin, seriously,” Eric says, “Graber said —”  


“I was listening,” Vince says, “I know what he said. White count, E, you know what that is? It’s what lets me not get a cold, it’s what lets me not fucking die of pneumonia or something. So go get my fucking medication, I’m sorry it’s such a hassle for you to keep me alive.”  


Eric is shaking when he stands up. He feels the other guys staring at him, he feels Vince’s anger like a slap. He walks back to Vince’s room and he can’t get his suitcase open because his hands are trembling, so he sits on the floor next to it and puts his head in his hands. There it is, the word they haven’t said, the thing Eric hasn’t thought about, doesn’t want to think about. Vince said _die_. He said, _alive_. Not since the day in the car after McNaight’s office have they talked about this in terms of living or dying; it’s been just getting through the days. It’s been just _until this is over_. And that’s why they’re here, because it’s almost over, and what they don’t talk about is that it isn’t, not really, that every month for the next year they’re going to be headed back to the clinic to get Vince checked, that Eric’s going to worry every single fucking night for the year — maybe for the rest of his life — that in the morning Vince will be standing in his doorway, hair still damp from the shower, saying he’s felt a new bump, saying his stomach hurts, saying he’s gonna fucking die.  


That’s it. That’s just it. He bends over and with one hand clenched in the nylon of his duffel carry-on he fucking weeps. He fucking sobs. He’s so tired and he’s so scared and there is nothing he can do, there’s never been anything he could do, he can’t protect Vince, he can’t even get him his fucking medication on time. He can’t think for how much his chest hurts at just the idea that Vince is gonna die or that they’re gonna have to go through this ever again. He can’t think about what it would be like, what it would mean, to wake up and _not_ have Vince on the other side of the bed or down the hall or just somewhere, God, please, somewhere out in the world, alive, OK, protected. Safe.  


It’s Drama who finds him, Drama who grabs him by the scruff of the neck like he’s a puppy or a nine-year-old, still, and drags him back and out into the nearest guest room, whispering at him in a weird harsh-tender voice that he needs to knock this shit off, Vince can hear him, does he want them all to fucking break down, what the fuck is his deal?  


And when Eric still can’t stop, Drama says, “Is this because you’re fucking him?”  


Eric laughs around another heaving cough of a sob. “No,” he says, and then, “yes,” and then, “I don’t know.”  


“Yeah, fuck,” Drama says, and he rubs Eric’s back in a way sort of like how Eric’s baseball coach did when he was little and he’d gotten popped with a line-drive, just a skittish, soothing hand back and forth across his shoulders. Eric sighs and feels like he’s getting better, like he can maybe breathe without crying like a fucking pussy if he just doesn’t think about it. Thinking about not thinking about it makes his face get hot and his eyes prickle warmly, and he casts desperately for something to focus on. Baseball, he thinks, the clank of the ball on the bat when they were kids, that time when he broke his arm sliding into third and still got called out though it seemed like they should’ve cut a kid a break. He keeps that in the foreground in his mind and hears himself say, “You’re gonna have to give him the shot, OK?”  


“Yeah,” Drama says. “I can do that.” He claps Eric’s shoulder and stands. “You OK?”  


“Fine,” Eric says, not looking at him. Not sure he can ever look at any of the guys again. “Hey, would you bring my bag in here?”  


“You bet.”  


There’s a bathroom attached to his room and he makes sure he’s in it when Drama comes back through, hears the plunk of his bag on the bed and then the closing of the door again, then still counts to ten and washes his face once more before he walks into his room. He locks the door, strips to his boxers, pulls a T-shirt out of the bag and puts it on, and climbs into bed. He’s worried he won’t be able to sleep, that he’ll worry and keep himself awake, right up until his head hits the pillow. It’s wonderfully soft and seems to suck the exhaustion up from his body and right into his head, right where it belongs, right where it has to be for him to fall into deep, dreamless, utterly comforting sleep.  


  


He wakes to a dark room and quiet. His first instinct is to just go back to sleep, and he closes his eyes but then has a terrible idea: maybe they’ve left without him. Maybe Vince packed the guys into a plane and went back to L.A. He sits up and listens hard, stops breathing in order to listen, but all he can hear is the ocean. So he gets up and steps into the hall, and from there he can hear Turtle’s snorty snores and he laughs at himself, says, quietly, “Idiot,” because they wouldn’t do that. Vince wouldn’t abandon him.  


He turns toward Vince’s room and tells himself it’s habit to go there, even though he’s in an unfamiliar place, even though he’s aware of deciding to go to Vince’s room. He turns the knob so slowly and carefully there’s hardly even a click, and the door glides silently open, then closed again behind him. And then he’s in Vince’s dark bedroom, where he can make Vince out under the khaki blanket, turned again on his stomach, facing the middle of the bed.  


Eric tiptoes over, then eases himself onto the bed and stretches out beside Vince on top of the covers. He turns on his side so he can look down at him. Vince has one arm under his pillow, his head turned toward Eric. Up close, in the dim moonlight, he doesn’t really look sick. Eric just looks at him and thinks, what the hell am I doing, but he already knows the answer. Even if this hadn’t happened, this is where he’s been headed ever since that night that Vince made his first move, maybe even for longer than that. Maybe since Vince called and said, “I need you to come out to California and fucking take care of shit,” and what Eric heard was, _take care of me_. Maybe since high school, when he was always Vince’s best alibi, protecting him from girls and teachers; maybe since grade school, when his house was Vince’s safe haven. All he wants is this, he just wants to take care of the guy, and maybe his reasons are a little more selfish than they used to be, but that’s part of the deal.  


Eric shifts on the bed, his arm brushing Vince’s, and Vince stirs, blinks, doesn’t pull away. “Hmm?”  


“Nothing,” Eric says, his hand already on Vince’s shoulder, soothing. “Just rest, all right?”  


“I’m OK,” Vince says, his eyes closing. “Don’t worry.”  


Eric thinks, Christ, I wish I could stop, but he doesn’t say it. He doesn’t say anything. He just lays there, his hand on Vince’s shoulder, until he falls fitfully back asleep.  


  


When he wakes up, it’s to Vince staring down at him.  


“I’m sorry I yelled at you,” Vince says, and Eric rubs his eyes.  


“What?”  


“Yesterday, about the shot.”  


Eric clears his throat. “Vin, it’s fine. You were right. And I wasn’t mad.” Vince is pretty close, and Eric can smell his toothpaste. It makes him think he should get up, get shaved and showered and ready for the day. He didn’t expect to wake up to an apology. “Did Drama give you your —”  


“Yeah.” Vince rubs his arm like just thinking of it hurts. “I’m glad that’s almost done, you know?”  


“You and me, both.” Eric sits up.  


“Where are you going?”  


“I just wanna brush my teeth,” Eric says. Something about Vince’s tone, the neediness there, is very appealing. It makes Eric feel like yesterday never happened, like everything’s going to be OK. “I’ll be right back.”  


So he goes down the hall to his room and brushes his teeth, hits the can, splashes some water over his face, and then stares at his shaving kit. He should move it back to Vince’s room. He should. But he pictures himself standing in the doorway, holding his tiny shaving kit, and he feels a little sad and a little pathetic and he gets it, OK, he’s in love with the guy and he wants to see their toothbrushes sitting next to each other in the little holder, he wants his clothes mixed up with Vince’s in the dresser, he wants, he wants, he wants. He clears his throat and washes his face again, leaves the shaving kit where it is, and goes back to Vince’s room, because he promised.  


“Hey c’mere,” Vince says, patting the bed next to him, and Eric nods and sits on the bed, his back to Vince, and he wonders if he should say something. He wonders what he should say. But then he hears the rustle of sheets and Vince is draped over his back, and he says, “I’m feeling kind of energetic, what do you think?” and Eric nods even though he knows, he gets, what a bad idea this is. But really, what he needs this morning, more than anything, is to know — to really, really _know_ — that Vince is OK, and when he’s laying on his side and Vince is inside of him and they’re both rocking and holding on to each other, Eric finally feels better. He feels like Vince is better.  


Afterwards, he turns so he’s facing Vince, who’s laying on his back, sweaty and smiling. “Still in pretty good shape,” he says, laughing a little and patting his own biceps. “Which, hey, have you heard anything from Ari recently?” Vince asks.  


“Oh, Christ.” Eric hasn’t talked to anyone about business in, well, way too long. Other than making the travel arrangements, he’s been dodging calls from Ari’s office left and right. “I, actually, I need to talk to you about that.”  


“Yeah?”  


“Yeah.” He stands up and puts his boxers back on, because business calls for underwear. “Ari, uh, he talked to someone at Amblin.” Vince lifts an eyebrow. “They wanted to know if you’d be free in the fall to start on _Rockets’ Red Glare_.”  


“Holy shit,” Vince says. “Fucking _Spielberg_?”  


“Yeah,” Eric says, and he watches Vince grin big and wide, and he smiles back. He thinks, this is enough. This can be enough for me, just having him here and happy and OK. “They’re gonna send the script, but I think —”  


“Yeah, of course, of course, fuck, let’s do it,” Vince says. “Wow, Jesus, I could totally blow you right now.”  


Eric laughs, feeling a little uncomfortable, sure that he’s blushing. “Skip that and buy me dinner tonight instead. And the guys.”  


“Fuck, yeah, we should totally celebrate,” Vince says. He stands up, naked and totally unselfconscious, and Eric averts his eyes. He’s glad, really. He’s glad that Vince is good again. He’s glad everything’s getting back to normal.  


  


That night, after Eric gives Vince his shot, they go to the hotel restaurant, which comes highly recommended, and they order just about everything on the menu and several bottles of expensive champagne. Vince stops with his first glass already in hand. “Is this OK?” he asks Eric quietly, and Eric nods. He checked the drug interactions; as long as he doesn’t go crazy, he’ll be fine. He tells Vince this and Vince laughs and takes a sip. “Here’s to not going crazy,” he proposes as a toast, and the other guys join in.  


After dinner, the host suggests a beach party, and Vince says it sounds fun. He must be feeling better, Eric thinks; he looks more energetic than the last few days. Maybe the shots are finally working. It really is going to be OK, he tells himself, following Vince and the guys down to the party.  


There’s a bonfire and a small bar, and they settle in with drinks — Vince back to just water, Eric nursing a beer — and watch some girls in bikinis dancing and laughing all around them. It doesn’t take long before they find their way over to Vince, and soon he’s necking with a slim black-haired girl, his hand casually draped over her breast. Eric tries to pay attention to the blonde who’s chatting him up, but he’s not interested. Truth is, he’s a little pissed. He should be happy for Vince, when he gets up and lets the girl lead him by the hand back toward the hotel, but he’s not. Not exactly. He’s jealous, he’ll allow himself that. And worried, a little, too, because maybe Vince shouldn’t be making out with strangers so soon. Maybe he shouldn’t be making out with anyone.  


Eric gets up and tells the other guys he’s gonna call it a night. They both have pretty tourists to entertain them, and Eric thinks it’s possible he’ll have the whole house to himself for the night. He walks home alone, gets a beer out of the fridge, and settles in on the couch. He’s glad, now, that he didn’t move his shaving kit into Vince’s room.  


  


About an hour later, just as he’s flipping through channels, the deck door slides open, and Vince walks in. Eric looks up, surprised. “Uh, hey,” he says, embarrassed at being alone, afraid he looks like he’s moping.  


“Hey,” Vince says. He drops onto the couch next to Eric. “What are you watching?”  


“Whatever’s on.” He hits the info button, finds out it’s Miami Vice, the remake movie. Vince says cool, which means he’s not paying attention. “What’s up? You OK?”  


“Yeah,” he says. “Tired. You know.”  


Eric nods. “You, uh, that girl seemed nice. How’d it go?”  


Vince reaches over and takes a sip of Eric’s beer. “It didn’t,” he says.  


“Oh.” Eric doesn’t know what to say, whether he should suggest calling McNaight or Graber or what. He remembers Vince saying last time they shouldn’t call anyone. “You, uh, you want a real drink?”  


“Yeah,” Vince says, slouching down. “That’d be good.”  


So Eric gets them each a gin and tonic, heavy on the gin, and when he sits down, Vince says, “Hey, are you all right? About Claire, I mean?”  


“Yeah,” Eric says. He takes a long drink. “I’m fine. No worries.”  


“Just you’re sitting here alone when a bunch of pretty girls are out on that beach. And you, if my memory of this morning is correct, have no difficulties.”  


Eric shrugs. “I’m kind of tired, too,” he says, and he hopes Vince will leave it. Leave it, he thinks, just fucking —  


“E, you gotta just get back out there,” Vince says. “Just because that girl was weird doesn’t mean —”  


Eric sighs. “It wasn’t her fault.”  


“Come on,” Vince says. “Then whose fault was it?”  


Eric keeps looking at him, and Vince meets his eyes and Eric sees him get it, sees Vince’s eyes get a little wide and then Vince groans and turns so his head is resting on the back of the couch, and he’s staring at the ceiling while Eric keeps staring at him. “Oh, fuck, E,” he says, and sighs. “I told you, I motherfucking — I told you not to fall for me.”  


“It doesn’t really work that way,” Eric says. Vince groans again and closes his eyes. “What the fuck was I supposed to do?” he asks, feeling anger on the edges of his embarrassment. “You know me. You know how I am. And the way —”  


“I know,” Vince says shortly. Eric doesn’t miss the fact that he shifts, just a little, so their knees aren’t touching anymore. Vince rubs his face, and finally, finally opens his eyes again. “So what do we do now? I mean — “  


“Nothing,” Eric says. It’s not like he thought this would end any other way. He’s always known that falling for Vince would be a one-sided disaster. “We do a whole lot of nothing, and I’ll get over it.”  


Vince looks over, and there’s a painful amount of hope in his eyes. “Yeah?”  


Eric nods. “I’ll skip New York with you guys. I don’t really need my mom picking up on this.”  


Vince nods. He takes a sip of his drink and sets it on the coffee table. “You know, I don’t know how to feel about the fact that you think you can get over me that fast.”  


“Me either,” Eric says. “But you’re OK now, so — that’s what’s left to do.”  


“The end of the story, huh?”  


“Sure,” Eric says. He finishes his drink. “I’m gonna get another, you want?”  


“Nah,” Vince says. He sits up. “I should probably turn in.” He looks tired, again, tired like he’s sick, and Eric feels instantly bad for having dropped this all on him right now.  


Then again, this is the same guy who had the energy to go off with some girl, the same guy who managed to fuck Eric pretty good that morning, so — he swallows his guilt and just says, “OK. Sleep well, man. If you need anything —”  


“Yeah,” Vince says, and by the time Eric gets back with his fresh drink, Vince is already gone.  


  


  


They stay in Hawaii for another two weeks. Vince gets better every day. He sleeps less, eats more. He makes it through a whole day without napping. Though he still gets tired more easily than he used to, even Turtle and Drama seem to notice that he’s really getting better. They start treating him like normal again — joking around with him, asking him for money, all of the stuff that Eric hadn’t even realized they cut out for the last month. They even start talking about girls again.  


Eric doesn’t mind. He keeps busy. He reads through the script when Ari e-mails it, takes a half-day to video conference with everyone back in L.A. about getting everything set up in contracts, and finally arranges for a sit-down with Vince and Spielberg once they’re back in L.A. — which he tells Ari will be two weeks from Saturday, giving Vince a nice week to spend at home with his mother.  


In between the work concerns, Eric still spends time with the guys. It’s not really even awkward. He hangs out with them, with Vince, just like usual, and sometimes when Vince catches his eye and smiles Eric has to work to make himself smile back, but most of the time it’s just OK. He’s got it figured out, at least, that he’s not really going to get over Vince. He’s not going to try. He’s just going to learn to live with it, and he’s going to be grateful to be around him. And he is grateful, he’s grateful for everything, from Vince’s improving health to the fact that Vince is making an effort to be kind to him, to look out for his feelings a little, by not banging every girl in the hotel.  


In fact, even though he seems recovered, Vince doesn’t go after any girls. Eric toys with the idea of telling Vince this isn’t necessary — he should be enjoying his health, and they’re at a resort full of girls who look like they’d be more than happy to help him out — but the truth is, he doesn’t want to watch Vince hooking up with anyone. So his compromise is to let the guys go out without him. Saturday, a week before they leave, he tells them he needs to stay in for a conference call with Ari — total bullshit — and then makes sure to mention that he’s also probably going to hit the sack right after because he’s got to talk to their New York travel agent — again, absolute fiction — very early the next morning. He sends them off, even claps Vince on the shoulder and tells him good luck, and then goes back to his room to watch television.  


He shouldn’t be surprised to hear the door open after a couple of hours. Really, he thinks, he shouldn’t be, but he is, and he’s more surprised when his bedroom door opens and Vince is standing there. He looks windblown, his hair sort of pushed back from his face like he’s been messing with it too much and his cheeks kind of pink, and Eric thinks for a moment, Jesus, he’s just come back from fucking some chick. But then Vince sits on the bed and Eric can smell the water on him, and when he says, “Where’ve you been?” Vince says, “Taking a walk,” and Eric believes him.  


He sits up against his headboard, rubs sleep out of his eyes. It’s not even midnight. “What’s up? You feel OK?”  


Vince nods. He sits beside Eric, and drops his hand onto Eric’s thigh. “I’ve been thinking,” Vince says, and then he pauses until Eric thinks he’ll have to prompt him. “What if it is that kind of story?” he asks.  


Eric mutes the TV. He wants to ask Vince to repeat it, but he heard him, he knows he did. “You mean where we’re both pathetically in love for all the wrong reasons?”  


“Yeah,” Vince says. He’s looking at the comforter.  


Eric suddenly has a very bad feeling about this. “What’s going on?” he asks. Vince draws his hand back but keeps looking down. “You struck out again tonight, huh?”  


“No,” Vince says, and he meets Eric’s eyes and everything.  


“You didn’t even try.” Eric shakes his head. Of course. Vince isn’t laying off the girls to spare Eric’s feelings. He’s laying off to spare himself some potential embarrassment. They haven’t talked any more about the other night, but Eric knows Vince called Graber himself to ask about possible side effects. He doesn’t know what Graber told him, and he hasn’t worked up the courage to ask.  


Vince shrugs. “Look, why should — I mean, what if we just try it for a while?”  


Eric looks at Vince’s hand instead of his face. “If you want to hook up while we’re here, then we can do that,” he says, even though it’s stupid, he knows he shouldn’t, it’s just going to make everything harder. But he can only resist so much. “But,” he says quietly, and sees Vince’s head jerk up in his peripheral vision, “I am actually in love with you, and I’ve been headed here for a while. I can’t keep doing this stupid one-night-out-of-nowhere shit all the time. So you want to get together while we’re here, fine, but then you go to New York and I’ll go to L.A., and when you get back, we’ll be back to normal. And this will be over.” For good, he thinks, but can’t quite make himself say it.  


Vince clears his throat, and Eric finally meets his eyes. He looks worried, scared, maybe a little turned on. “That doesn’t sound very fair,” he says.  


Eric shrugs. “What part of this has been, so far?”  


Vince keeps looking at him, and then after a moment, he nods, and reaches out and touches Eric’s cheek, and kisses him slow and tender like, well, like Eric wants him to.  


After that, it’s a week of sex nearly every night, with only one misfire — Vince’s term — on a night when they’ve both been doing some drinking and Vince is tired from swimming. Then, that next Saturday, they pack everything up and catch a flight back to L.A., and Eric waves from the tarmac as the guys take off for New York. Once they’re gone, he gets into the car he pre-arranged, takes a shot of Jack from the minibar en route, and walks into the house to start his scheduled week of wallowing. He lines up a couple of bottles of booze, packs the bong, and settles to mourn his not-to-be romance with Vince.  


The next day, after he wakes up late — not hungover, because he fell asleep before he could get too drunk — and calls the maid service, schedules a major deep cleaning of everything. By the time the guys get back, he wants every trace of Vince being sick erased. He considers throwing away the garbage can in Vince’s room, _does_ throw away the bloodied pillow case and pillow, and then cleans all of the protein shakes out of the fridge. He makes sure they’re restocked with beer and liquor, too. He picks Arnold up from the kennel just before closing, and the dog is so happy to see him that Eric almost likes him. He takes him for a walk that evening and gets home just as the house phone is ringing.  


“Yeah?”  


“Did I catch you at something?” Vince asks, with a funny leer.  


Eric rolls his eyes. “Walking the dog.”  


“That what they call it out in California?”  


“You’re back in New York ten minutes, you’re already a retard again,” Eric says. Vince laughs. “So what’s up?”  


“Well, it’s funny. It’s been, uh, pointed out to me that to not fall in love back with the guy who’s nursed you back to health is, well, pretty much grade-A asshole behavior.”  


“Someone told you you’re an asshole?” Eric wonders if that’s Drama or Turtle. Maybe both.  


“Yeah. And also, they said that I’m in love with you.”  


Eric sighs. Vince has always taken direction well. And to heart. “Vin, someone tells you the sky is green, that’s a pretty dumb reason to believe it.”  


And Vince says, “Not if it’s true.” There’s a pause, and Eric tries to figure out what that means. True — that he’s an asshole? Or that he’s — Eric can’t quite get there. “I’ve been thinking about what you said,” Vince says.  


“Which part?”  


“The part where it’ll all be over when I get back to L.A.” Eric takes a seat at the island in the kitchen. He hasn’t turned on any lights, and the sun is going down behind him, so the room is purplish and dark.  


“Yeah.”  


“This is never going to be over for me,” Vince says. “The whole thing, I mean. If I’m lucky, I’ll forget about it sometimes, but — it’s always going to be just around the corner.”  


Eric swallows, because this was the part he thought he kept from Vince. This was the part he wanted to keep from him; he wanted this worry to be his own. “Vin,” he starts.  


“And if it’s not this, then something else,” Vince says, pushing right through, his voice steady but going faster as he talks. “It’s always going to be something, right? If not cancer, then the career. If not the career, then — god knows what, right?” He pauses for a breath, and Eric doesn’t break in. Can’t. “And you know what, you’re the only person in my life that I want — no, that I need to be around for stuff like that. E, you practically keep me alive.”  


Eric rolls his eyes. “Come on.”  


“You come on, I’m telling the truth.”  


“So what, you wanna be with me, what, because you might get sick again? Vince —”  


“It’s not because I’m sick,” Vince says, and now he’s talking slow, certain, like he’s on camera, like this is the biggest scene of his life. Maybe, Eric thinks, maybe it is. “It’s not because I’m dying, it’s because I’m gonna live. I wanna be with you because I’m gonna live. That’s the reason.”  


“Oh.” There’s silence for a minute, because Eric wants to argue, but he can’t think of anything to say. There’s no way to refute that. Even if he wanted to. “That’s a pretty good reason,” he says, finally, aware his voice is a little rough.  


“I thought so, too,” Vince says, and he sounds amused.  


Eric clears his throat. “You practiced that?”  


“On your sister,” he says, and Eric laughs. “She liked it. If this doesn’t go well, I might be joining your family anyway.”  


“Hey, fuck you,” Eric says.  


“So — _is_ this going well?”  


He’s smiling into the dark. “Yeah,” he says. “It’s going great.”  


“Thank God,” Vince says. “Hang on. Ma, he said yes, he loves me, too.”  


“Thank the fucking lord,” Eric hears, and he’s blushing from three-thousand miles away.  


“You talked to your mother about this?”  


“Who do you think told me to get my act together?”  


And now Eric’s grinning and laughing, and he can hear the cacophony of the Chase household behind Vince and he doesn’t even care, he’s already too happy. “Jesus — wait, so you really told my sister?”  


“Oh, your sister knew,” Vince says. “In fact, everybody fucking knew. Way before us. Apparently, it’s been that kind of story for a very long time.”  


“Huh.”  


“Oh — wait, hang on, you’re —” and then there’s the sound of the phone being shuffled, and the next voice Eric hears is Vince’s mom.  


“So are you gonna get your ass on a plane or what, Eric?”  


“Rita?”  


“My son’s spent the last twenty-four hours telling me how you’ve been fucking nursing him through sickness and health, you don’t think you’ve got a hug and a big-ass pie coming to you?”  


Eric laughs. “I, uh, pie, huh? Wow, what kind?”  


“Peach, honey, just like you like. But get on that plane now, OK? Your mother wants to see you, too.”  


“All right,” Eric says, and in his mind he’s already making the arrangement, he’s already got Arnold back at the kennel. He’s already sitting in Vince’s mother’s kitchen. He’s already sitting next to Vince. “I’m on my way.”  



	11. Epilogue

Epilogue: Six Months Later.  


  


There’s a heavy knock on the trailer door. “Ten minutes!” a PA calls, and Eric yells back an OK. He looks down at Vince, who’s sprawled over the couch and Eric, catching a nap before he has to go back for nighttime costuming. Eric rubs his hand through Vince’s hair and Vince grunts, turns a little to face him.  


“Oh, hey,” Vince says, a sleepy smile spreading across his face.  


“Hey yourself,” Eric says. “Time to get up.”  


“I don’t want to.” Vince settles back down, his head and one hand on Eric’s thigh, his fingers kneading Eric’s skin not-quite-comfortably.  


“Ten minutes.”  


“It’s never really ten minutes,” he says.  


Eric tugs on his hair, which earns him a scowl and makes the kneading stop. “C’mon, get up,” he says.  


“Nah.”  


“My leg’s been asleep for half an hour.”  


“Just because you get up doesn’t mean I have to,” Vince says.  


So Eric says fine and stands up, rolling Vince to the floor in the process. He laughs and shakes his head, accepts a hand up from Eric, and eventually heads to the little trailer bathroom. While he’s in there, Eric paces a little to stretch his leg.  


He spent three months after Hawaii and New York treating Vince like he was made of glass: spoiling him, Drama called it. Then, the third time they went in, McNaight not only cleared Vince for cancer, again, but also cleared him to do the movie. “There’s nothing you were doing before you couldn’t be doing now,” he said, and something inside of Eric that had been tense and frightened since that first insurance physical relaxed, enough that he made Vince get up to get his own damn beer the next day.  


Since then, things have been pretty much back to normal.  


“Hmm,” Vince says, wrapping his arms around Eric from behind. He kisses Eric’s neck, and Eric thinks, OK, almost normal. Better than normal. “Hi there,” Vince murmurs against his neck.  


Eric glances over, sees that the door is locked, and relaxes back into Vince’s embrace. “Now you’re awake.”  


“Seriously, I hate working at night,” Vince says, one of his hands hooking in Eric’s belt loops. Eric turns when he tugs. “It totally throws off our sex rhythm.”  


“Our what?” Eric says, laughing.  


“You know what I mean,” Vince says, and he kisses Eric. Eric responds, puts his hands on Vince’s shoulders to steady himself. If he’s being honest, he maybe has an idea of what Vince means about a rhythm: before filming started, they were having sex almost every night, provided they were home, together, at the end of the night. There have only been a few misfires since Hawaii, and none in the last two months at all. In fact, Vince's sexual confidence seems pretty well restored to its previous levels, particularly if the hand on Eric’s fly is any indication.  


“OK, there’s no time for –“  


“It really never is just ten minutes,” Vince says, sliding to his knees.  


“Neither is this,” Eric says, but it comes out like a sigh because Vince already has his dick out. He gives in. It doesn’t matter if there’s a PA waiting outside, doesn’t matter if everyone on set is listening to them from outside. Nothing, anymore, matters but this: he has Vince. He has Vince, healthy and happy and wanting him, and he’s grateful every moment.  



End file.
